Englund

Bessent’s Bond-Burner Wasn’t the Big Move He Hoped The problem, after Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent made a small but hugely symbolic move to stop the steady rise in longer bond yields, is that even his power appears to be limited. Drastic changes in fiscal policy are needed, not signaling and symbols. Bessent’s key intervention, announced as Wall Street opened, was to double the amount of 10-year and longer bonds that the Treasury can buy back. If you think this sounds like something the Fed would do, you would be right.  Monetary policy ever since the Global Financial Crisis has revolved around quantitative easing (QE) — buying bonds to push down their yields. Kevin Warsh, the new Fed chairman, wants to move away from that and shrink the central bank’s enormous holdings of bonds.  The 30-year yield — at its highest since the eve of the crisis in 2007 —dropped eight basis points. But the upward trend remains intact. John Authers Bloomberg August 20, 2026 https://www.bloombe...

Could Japan bring down the world economy? Japan’s vast hoard of financial assets means that problems in its economy can reverberate across the globe. What caused this mess? Is America right to intervene? And could Japan cause a crisis in the global financial system?   The Economist Recorded on Aug 14th · 41 min https://www.economist.com/insider/inside-economics/could-japan-bring-down-the-world-economy Elections in Ukraine?  Former Ukrainian defence minister Mykhailo Fedorov has launched a sweeping political broadside against Volodymyr Zelenskyy, warning the president that rampant corruption is undermining the country’s ability to fight Russia and calling for extraordinary wartime elections. Financial Times 18 August 2026 https://www.ft.com/content/7bf79169-f84f-44a2-b64d-c1a3d1fb7d08?syn-25a6b1a6=1 The popular former Ukrainian defense minister, whose firing by President Volodymyr Zelenskyy triggered nationwide protests, strongly hinted at his political ambitions with a la...

  https://www.marketwatch.com/story/why-it-pays-to-stay-invested-no-amount-of-bad-news-could-stop-the-stock-markets-strongest-run-in-more-than-25-years-54ba3f8a Tunga techfall på Wall Street – Klarna rasade 23 procent De ledande indexen på Wall Street stängde på rött för tredje handelsdagen i rad när inflationsoro kylde ner riskaptiten. https://www.di.se/live/tunga-techfall-pa-wall-street-klarna-rasade/ The rise in the US is part of a broader global shift as investors demand more compensation to protect against the risk of persistently high inflation that’s likely to keep short-term interest rates elevated. The movement is also being fueled by a ramp-up of corporate borrowing to fund the artificial-intelligence investment boom and waning demand from traditional buyers of long-dated bonds. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2026-08-17/us-bond-selloff-drives-30-year-yields-to-the-highest-since-2007 Global Bond Slump Sends Long-Term Borrowing Costs to Highest in Decades https://w...

Hans teori styr centralbankers penningpolitik globalt.   – Han sökte sig till striden, säger Lars Jonung. Han är professor emeritus vid Lunds universitet, där även Wicksell var professor. Friedmans idé om att styra penningmängden har övergetts av centralbankerna. Keynes syn på penningpolitiken som underordnad finanspolitiken, med full sysselsättning som mål, har inte heller segrat. Kärnan i Wicksells analys är en skillnad mellan två räntor: låneräntan, som sätts av centralbanken, och ”den naturliga räntan”.  Så fort den naturliga räntan avviker från den bankränta som är gällande får vi ett gap som antingen ger uppgång till en kreditexpansion eller en kreditåtstramning, säger Lars Jonung. Nu lyfter det amerikanska magasinet Fortune fram en ny tolkning av Wicksell, framförd av ekonomer på den tyska storbanken Deutsche Bank. Är tyskarna på rätt väg eller inte?  Jag tror att de tänker fel, säger Lars Jonung. Birgitta Forsberg SvD 2026-08-16 https://www.svd.se/a/Bxzyn7/ra...

De ledande amerikanska indexen stängde på rött under måndagen när förhoppningarna om ett avtal för att avsluta det nästan sex månader långa kriget i Mellanöstern dämpats och oljepriset fått fart uppåt. https://www.di.se/live/techjattar-stretade-emot-pa-rott-wall-street/   Sargassohavet, The Sargasso Sea; a model for global markets  https://englundmacro.blogspot.com/2026/08/sargassohavet-sargasso-sea-model-for.html Central Banks; By becoming market makers of last resort, policymakers are pumping up leverage and risk. Leverage 100 times. https://englundmacro.blogspot.com/2026/08/central-banks-by-becoming-market-makers.html Knut Wicksell aktuell igen. r*  Styr centralbankers penningpolitik globalt.      https://englundmacro.blogspot.com/2026/08/nu-ar-nationalekonomen-knut-wicksell.html Maga Europe Trump’s new right sees the continent as both ancestral home and ideological battleground. https://englundmacro.blogspot.com/2026/08/why-maga-came-for-europe.html Sto...

The Sargasso Sea, an elliptical area of the Atlantic around Bermuda, is a model for global markets in the depths of this hot summer. An area of relative calm caused by the space between four major Atlantic currents. As for the obvious geopolitical risks, there is a belief — correct or otherwise — that the market has a handle on them, and that they are less than catastrophic.  Equanimity is a state of psychological stability and composure which is undisturbed by the experience of or exposure to emotions, pain, or other phenomena that may otherwise cause a loss of mental balance.   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equanimity Whether markets are right to be this confident is another question. Meanwhile, the greatest risk, also diminished slightly by the slowdown in the recent data, comes from bonds.  But as it stands, Great Earnings + Goldilocks Economic Data + Absence of News = Continued Calm.  Just like eels must leave the Sargasso, this cannot go on indefinitely, but wi...

Men vd Sandra Gadd är inte helt nöjd. ”Kvartalet belastas fortfarande av kostnader som jag tycker är för höga”, skriver hon. https://www.di.se/live/kjell-och-company-bryter-dyster-trend/

Vad är en Jordan B Peterson i sina udda kostymer och pladder om humrars av gud givna hierarkiska ordning annat än verklighetens Dr. Fox? När allt handlar om genomslag så blir formen, karisman, skamlösheten överställt allt. För att det funkar. Något som har smittat av sig på dagens politiska retorik. Johannes Klenell DN 5 juni 2026 https://www.dn.se/kultur/johannes-klenell-tror-ebba-busch-att-valjarna-ar-dumma-i-huvudet/ Fotnot: Jag gillar både Ebba och Jordan.  

Trump’s new right sees the continent as both ancestral home and ideological battleground. From the vice-president down, US officials have cast themselves as being on a mission to save western civilisation from the continent they see as its cradle.  Mass migration, curbs on speech and the surrender of national sovereignty, they argue, threaten not only the transatlantic relationship but the very idea of Europe. “We don’t save the west if Europe doesn’t get its act together,” said Kevin Roberts, president of the Heritage Foundation, the conservative think-tank that helped to draw up the agenda for Donald Trump’s second term.  “I’ve been worried for a long time, for the better part of two decades, that Europe was committing civilisational suicide.”  “The civilisation that we’re defending is 3,500 years old,” he added, tracing it back through Jerusalem, Athens, Rome, London and Philadelphia.  Maga’s stark new theory of the Atlantic alliance was set out by the US vice-pre...

Central banks may be accidentally subsidizing government borrowing through their efforts to prevent a repeat of past market blowups, and policymakers are starting to worry that anticrisis lending facilities could even be interfering with their own monetary policy. The source of the problem is the switch from central banks being the lender of last resort to, in 2008 and 2020, also being market makers of last resort, ensuring corporate—and government—debt markets keep functioning. During a crisis, support is often essential to prevent a downward spiral that destroys the financial system. But backstopping markets removes a key risk and encourages more borrowing—especially for the hedge funds that now own trillions of dollars of U.S. Treasurys. The scale is extraordinary: The Dallas Fed estimates hedge funds ended last year with $2.4 trillion of Treasurys, up from $600 billion a decade earlier.  Because the profits on each trade are tiny, hedge funds have to leverage as much as 100 tim...

The plans include a short-term fix for an ailing reservoir and longer-term efforts to keep the river flowing. It is unclear how effective these measures will be. The Colorado River provides water for 40 million people and more than 5 million acres of farmland. But drought and overuse have drained its reservoirs. Wall Street Journal Aug. 16, 2026 https://www.wsj.com/us-news/climate-environment/the-colorado-river-is-shrinking-see-how-authorities-are-trying-to-save-it-d43ff9fa Lake Powell, the second-largest reservoir in the United States, provides water and electricity to millions in the West.  It has now has shrunk to its lowest level on record, in the latest sign of the alarming crisis unfolding on the drought-stricken Colorado River. CNN 16 August 2026 https://edition.cnn.com/2026/08/16/climate/lake-powell-reservoir-record-low-colorado-river The Colorado River Is on the Brink of Disaster, 40 Million People Rely Years of drought and political brinkmanship have pushed the waterway t...

A mobile game made by a developer in Manchester has recently beaten the global phenomenon Minecraft to top Apple's paid games chart.  Its success is perhaps even more surprising given its subject matter - UK politics. No 10: Full Confidence by Benjamin Brewis sees players take on the role of prime minister, making decisions through a wave of parliamentary scenarios and trying to remain in power for as long as possible. BBC 16 August 2026 https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cq56pzqy6jvo https://fullconfidence.co.uk/

När jag gick i nian fick vi se en film i skolan om klimatkrisen. Jag hade nyss fyllt femton och blivit lite samhällsintresserad. Vidden av klimatkrisen hade jag dock inte förstått innan läraren släckte ner klassrummet och satte på projektorn. På duken visades en liten ensam isbjörn på ett drivande isflak. Glaciärer som kalvade och enorma isblock som rasade ner i havet. Skogar i lågor med flera meter höga eldväggar. Döda träd som sträckte sig mot himlen. Scenerna ackompanjerades av dramatisk musik och experter som förkunnade att slutet var nära. Jag uppfattade två budskap. Det ena var att vi måste göra något nu. Det andra var att det förmodligen redan var för sent. Tankarna for i huvudet. Å ena sidan: Det här kan omöjligt vara sant, för i så fall skulle jag redan ha vetat om det. Det skulle vara det enda människor pratade om. Å andra sidan: Varför skulle skolan visa en film om något som inte var sant? Varför skulle experter säga något som inte stämde? När jag försökte prata med mina vän...

Even now, when weather records are being broken, when climate change is demonstrably here, not in the future, we seem frozen.  We still go about our carbon-greedy lives: snapping up the last air-conditioning unit, booking another flight, seeking solace in the pathetic fallacy of recycling things we maybe didn’t need at all. It’s not that we don’t care. Multiple studies across the world find the majority of people now take climate change very seriously. But the scale of the thing can mire us in apathy. Shouting “fire” doesn’t work. I’ve learnt from experience that doom-mongering leads people either to turn away or become overwhelmed by the scale of the problem. Camilla Cavendish Financial Times 15 August 2026 https://www.ft.com/content/63a28eea-9d73-487b-bb46-34530e215fce?syn-25a6b1a6=1 Climate action does not seem to be a priority for the German government — despite record temperatures, heat-related deaths and drought. Why aren't more people taking to the streets in protest? https:...

A dangerous view is creeping into the markets that the US has already gone so far down the path of a debt compound trap that it dare not raise interest rates to control inflation. The US treasury has to roll over $6tn of debt every three months in an increasingly sceptical market, as well as issuing $2tn of new debt annually to cover the worst structural deficit in US peacetime history. The critical point is that the whole US financial and fiscal system has never been so sensitive to short-term interest rates. Kevin Warsh, the untested new Fed chairman, faces an invidious choice. Warsh struggled to articulate a coherent intellectual argument after the most recent policy meeting for why he was not raising rates.  He could not explain how he intends to bring stubborn US inflation back towards the 2pc target when it is clearly going the other way. Ambrose Evans-Pritchard Telegraph 11 August 2026 https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2026/08/11/ingredients-coming-together-us-fiscal-fina...

Att USA säljer euro för att stötta den japanska yenen riktar fokus mot landets egna förment riskfria obligationer. USA:s och Japans gemensamma insats för att skicka upp värdet på den japanska yenen.  1985 Plaza Accord. Detta avtal undertecknades på Plaza Hotel i New York efter att USA drivit på för att försvaga dollarn genom att hota med kraftiga importtullar efter att bytesbalansen hade blivit kraftigt negativ och den amerikanska globala konkurrenskraften försvagats. USA fick då igenom en kraftig revalvering av framför allt den japanska yenen och den västtyska D-marken.  På tre år sjönk den amerikanska dollarn med nästan 50 procent mot en handelsvägs korg av andra valutor. RE: När dollarn försvagas går kronan upp. Dollarn kostade drygt fem kronor 1992. Men den kursen skulle försvaras, ansåg Carl Bildt som ville avskaffa kronan och ansluta oss till euron.  Något har hänt med de amerikanska statsobligationerna. Räntan har stadigt tickat uppåt relativt inflationen under lån...