Englund

I augusti såldes fler villor än under någon annan augustimånad sedan mätserien började 2005. I landet som helhet steg villapriserna med 0,6 procent i augusti.  På ett år är uppgången 3,9 procent. Stormalmö stod för den största prisökningen, 0,9 procent. I Storstockholm steg priserna med 0,5 procent, medan de var i stort sett oförändrade i Storgöteborg. Än så länge ser vi inga tydliga effekter av ränteoron på bostadsmarknaden. Vi ser positivt på de kommande månaderna och på nästa årt, säger Bjurfors vd Irja Amolin i en kommentar. SvD 8 september 2026 https://www.svd.se/a/7poJ93/rekordmanga-villor-saljs-men-an-syns-inget-prisrally Prisras på bostäder i juli – Det är överraskande, säger Robert Boije. https://englundmacro.blogspot.com/2026/08/prisras-pa-bostader-i-juli-det-ar.html

  Jean-Luc Melenchon France, Europe’s No. 2 economy, troubles are feeding voters’ populist turn.  Political risk linked to the decent chance of the hard-right Marine Le Pen becoming president.  Melenchon’s polling a close second to Le Pen shows French voters are very much tempted by the idea of bailing themselves out to avoid confronting the country’s profligate social spending and pension outlays. Nominal growth in gross domestic product falling off a cliff and bond yields climbing to their highest level since 2008. Central bankers mustn’t confuse the inflation seen in America’s AI-boom economy with that of France and Germany, where yearly growth is expected at below 1%. These will add to an already fearsome challenge for the ECB’s officials. Should they stick doggedly to their inflation-busting mandate, even if it nudges France ever closer to crisis and gives Melenchon’s brand of recklessness even broader support? Bloomberg 8 September 2026 https://www.bloomberg.com/opi...

  https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2026-09-03/world-s-unusually-high-dollar-exposure-risks-fueling-selloff Is the world running away from American assets? This week US Treasury reported that overseas investors bought a net $1.55tn of long-term US financial assets in 2025, up — yes, up — from a net $1.18tn in 2024.  What does this imply? One obvious point is it shows that fears of a “sell America” capital flight currently are wildly overdone, whatever the world thinks of Trump. Gillian Tett 20 February 2026 https://englundmacro.blogspot.com/2026/02/americas-investment-position-with-rest.html

  3 percent inflation looks like it may be here to stay. Adam Tooze Substack Sep 5, 2026 https://adamtooze.substack.com/ Om vi lyckas med penningpolitiken, vilket vi kommer att göra, kommer inflationsuppgången under de senaste fem åren att höra till historien", sade Fed-chefen Kevin Warsh.  https://englundmacro.blogspot.com/2026/07/inflation-is-still-too-high.html De som på djupet förstår vad som utspelat sig under sommaren 2026 har panik: glaciärer som brister i Himalaya med våldsamma lerskred som följd, 35.000 värmerelaterade dödsfall i Europa, skogsbränder och torrlagda floder. Men vreden hos de som ser det existensiella hotet mot mänskligheten är politiskt ofarlig. Det vet partiledarna. Därför var de helt tysta när 50 000 människor i augusti demonstrerade i Stockholm i en av de största klimatmanifestationerna i modern tid. Miljörörelsen må vara stor, men så länge Miljöpartiet, som är klimatrörelsens parlamentariska gren, bara får åtta procent och inte 30 procent i opinions...

Keynes reasoned that government needed to act as spender and risk-taker of first resort. Doing so could revive the animal spirits of the private sector and, with them, growth. And when put into practice, this Keynesian multiplier largely worked, helping reflate the world out of the Depression. Having dominated policymaking up to the 1970s, Keynesianism was then jettisoned for monetarist policies as stagflation displaced stagnation. A remarkable comeback in response to a new set of conjoined crises, the global financial crisis, Covid and the Russia-Ukraine war. Indeed, the new interventions have dwarfed any previous peacetime stimulus. But if people anticipate that borrowing today means higher taxes tomorrow, stimulus might prompt saving rather than spending — something first identified by David Ricardo in 1820. Historically, economists have been sceptical about the ability of households and companies to anticipate future tax rises when making spending choices. But ... After missing inf...

Is the AI revolution real? Obviously. Will it deliver returns to match the high cost of building it out? Maybe.  Who will capture the economic value? That’s harder. New technologies often trace a similar pattern. Railways, electricity, cars, the internet and now AI have had three phases.  First, an innovative technology. Next, the infrastructure to deliver that technology to a mass market. Only then do the real beneficiaries emerge. The right question to ask now is what happens and who benefits when what is scarce today becomes abundant tomorrow.   It will only be when everyone’s computer is running Claude or Perplexity, and we’ve all worked out how to use it, that AI will be transformative.  Another pertinent question is: what becomes possible when everyone has AI? The biggest risk for today’s AI winners is not that AI fails but that it is so successful that the scarcity they can sell so profitably today becomes an abundant and cheap commodity. Tom Stevenson Te...

John Hassler och Överskottsmålet: Det har blivit någon sorts intellektuell regrediering. Assar Lindbeck. Calmfors. Elisabeth Svantesson. https://englundmacro.blogspot.com/2026/09/john-hassler-det-har-blivit-nagon-sorts.html AI. The right questions to ask are evolving. The biggest risk for today’s AI winners is not that AI fails but that it is so successful that the scarcity they can sell so profitably today becomes an abundant and cheap commodity. https://englundmacro.blogspot.com/2026/09/ai-right-questions-to-ask-are-evolving.html Hur kommer det sig att Birgitta Ed på kort tid har gått från hyllad till en belastning för Ulf Kristersson? I Moderata ungdomsförbundet, Muf, föll hon som 15-åring för den nästan fem år äldre Ulf Kristersson som hon var ”dödligt förälskad i”.  Birgitta Ed knöts till den borgerliga regeringen som tjänsteman och blev så småningom politiskt sakkunnig åt Europaminister Ulf Dinkelspiel (M). Efter segern i EU-omröstningen 1994 startade hon pr-byrån Sagt & ...

Den finanspolitiska tryggheten har ”raserats” och tajmingen för politikernas alla satsningar är ”helt oacceptabel”. Det säger en av finansministerns rådgivare, professor John Hassler.  Hassler är inte vem som helst. Under många år var han ordförande i Finanspolitiska rådet, myndigheten som är en vakthund för ekonomisk politik.  I dag är han en av ledamöterna i finansminister Elisabeth Svantessons ekonomiska råd. https://www.regeringen.se/pressmeddelanden/2023/01/finansministerns-forsta-mote-med-ekonomiska-radet/ I dagarna invigs också Assar Lindbeck centrum vid universitetet, med John Hassler som föreståndare. Uppdraget är att ge ”råd till beslutsfattare och en bred allmänhet”. Lars Calmfors, professor emeritus och också medlem av finansministerns ekonomiska råd, sa härom dagen till och med att ”alla partier har övergett det finanspolitiska ramverket”. – Jag håller helt med Calmfors. Det är en upplösning av normerna, säger Hassler. Men kan man verkligen prata om att ramverket ...

  Tall i sol, Lidingö. Tall i sol, som Monnet, enligt Ai-Perplexity.

  France and Spain have been among the hottest locations this week with temperatures exceeding 40C at times. On Thursday, El Granado in south-west Spain reached 45.7C, the country's highest temperature recorded this year. It is very unusual for the annual maximum temperature to occur outside of July and August. The extreme heat is forecast to intensify for central and eastern areas over the next few days. BBC 5 September 2026 https://www.bbc.com/weather/articles/cyvzq94g604o

  Andréa Hedin (M), oppositionsborgarråd i Stockholms stad, är upprörd över Socialdemokraternas planer på en krog i kommunal regi.  Foto: Freya Sirkén Epoch Times 5 september 2026 https://www.epochtimes.se/politisk-strid-om-kommunal-krog Andréa Marieanna Arlene Hedin, född Ström https://sv.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andr%C3%A9a_Hedin#%C3%96versikt

Socialism with Chinese characteristics. Socialism with Chinese characteristics is a term used by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and the People's Republic of China (PRC) to encompass its political theories and policies. The term was first established by Deng Xiaoping in 1982. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialism_with_Chinese_characteristics Deng visited Singapore in November 1978. Lee Kuan Yew told him that if Singapore Chinese who were the descendants of poorly-educated coolies could make good, how much better mainland China could be if the right policies were adopted. Besöket skulle i grunden rita om världsekonomin. https://englundmacro.blogspot.com/2024/06/deng-xiaoping-ran-china-despite-having.html "Your gateway to trusted insight and commentary from China's most influential voices – straight from the heart of Shanghai." "We will support foreign-invested enterprises to become more effectively integrated into China's vast market and encourage them to ...

The "Correct the Map" resolution, sponsored by Togo and backed by African Union (AU) members, passed with the support of 164 nations, including France and the UK. The United States was the only nation to vote against it - and there were six abstentions. The Mercator map, which has been in common use since the 16th Century, has come in for criticism as it shows Africa as similar in size to Greenland, even though it is 14 times larger. The distortion of his map is a result of the fact that it is impossible to accurately represent the surface of a globe on a two-dimensional chart. Whenever a map of the world is drawn, compromises need to be made. BBC 4 September 2026 https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/ce30vp55dnlo All map projections are imperfect https://englundmacro.blogspot.com/2026/02/all-map-projections-are-imperfect.html

  Brent crude is up almost 60% this year Iran’s forces continued to target vessels transiting Hormuz this week, and fired missiles at Jordan, Kuwait and Bahrain.  https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2026-09-03/latest-oil-market-news-and-analysis-for-sept-4 Dåliga nyheter är goda nyheter. Under fredagseftermiddagen är det dags för färska amerikanska jobbsiffror.  Ipek Ozkardeskaya, marknadsstrateg på Swissquote Bank, poängterar att en svag jobbsiffra hade kunnat ge ränteduvorna i Fed medvind och trycka ned på marknadsräntorna och dollar samt ge stöd till aktiemarknaden. ”Om de amerikanska jobbsiffrorna däremot är starka, och det är en möjlighet, så kommer marknadens fokus och rädsla fortsätta att riktas mot inflationen. Det kan lyfta räntorna ytterligare och tynga aktievärderingarna”, skriver hon i ett morgonbrev. Viktor Mölne DI 4 september 2026, 10:49 https://www.di.se/nyheter/dags-for-manadens-viktigaste-siffra-sa-ar-forvantningarna/   US Adds 162,000 Jobs, Top...

The U.S. trade deficit in goods and services in July grew to the biggest gap in 16 months in July, as America imported more electronics to feed the country’s artificial intelligence boom. The monthly trade deficit, the gap between what the United States imports and what it exports, hit $88.6 billion in the month. New York Times 3 September 2026 https://www.nytimes.com/2026/09/03/business/economy/us-trade-defecit-july.html International Trade in Goods and Services BEA https://www.bea.gov/data/intl-trade-investment/international-trade-goods-and-services Mortgage rates /Bolåneräntan/ ticked up to a new high for the year, casting a chill over the US housing market. The 30-year mortgage rate jumped 5 basis points to an average of 6.71% https://www.marketwatch.com/story/7-mortgage-rates-are-already-here-some-buyers-mortgage-experts-say-c51a7e04 Nvidia Agrees to Buy AI Platform Hugging Face for $13 Billion Deal ramps up Nvidia’s efforts to promote open-weight AI models that pose competitive t...

https://www.eeas.europa.eu/_en Europeiska utrikestjänsten https://european-union.europa.eu/institutions-law-budget/institutions-and-bodies/search-all-eu-institutions-and-bodies/european-external-action-service-eeas_sv Senior officials have begun studying which functions of the European External Action Service (EEAS) could be absorbed by existing Commission departments. A partial reversal of one of the EU’s biggest institutional reforms of the past two decades. France and Germany have proposed giving Kallas a stronger personal role in any reformed structure, with greater oversight of the Commission’s enlarged external relations portfolio. A rump EEAS would remain outside the Commission and oversee areas such as EU peacekeeping missions and military training, the people said. “There are ongoing reflections and discussions on how to reform and strengthen the EU’s external action,” said a Commission spokesperson. Financial Times 2 September 2026 https://www.ft.com/content/1e55d948-98e5-4c1...

Nvidia stiger med omkring 3,5 procent och är bara 5 procent från den rekordkurs som noterades i maj i år. Nvidia är världens största börsbolag med ett värde på över 5.400 miljarder dollar,  motsvarande 52.000 miljarder kronor.  Victor Hultgren DI 2 september 2026  https://www.di.se/live/nvidia-narmar-sig-rekord-betydande-uppsida-i-aktien/ Why is France being so nice to Britain?  One clue to the new entente may in fact lie not in the British Museum but in a superb new French two-part biopic of Charles de Gaulle, “La Bataille de Gaulle”.  Directed by Antonin Baudry, an ex-diplomat, it is—unusually for a French production—based on a British biography, “A Certain Idea of France: The Life of Charles de Gaulle”. Written by Julian Jackson, a historian at Queen Mary University of London, the 928-pager is the product of years of painstaking archival research.  It is an even-handed examination of both the visionary greatness and human fragility of le général. Of part...