“We must accept finite disappointment, but must never lose infinite hope.” – Martin Luther King Jr.
See for yourself the impressive improvement in the Debt/GDP ratio of Greece and Portugal! Yes, inflation works very well to lighten the burden of public debts, provided we fix the duration of our loans and do not issue inflation-indexed debt. The deprivations inflicted on our populations are much more a matter of punitive intent than…
They have brought Europe to a standstill. The productivity differential is widening further every quarter between us and the United States, who are racing ahead, far ahead of the European Union with their 2.6% growth compared to the pitiful European regression of 1.2%. Mario Draghi warned us a few months ago, stating that…
April 9, 2024 Dear Federal Councillors, I am a candidate to succeed Mr. Thomas Jordan as the President of the Swiss National Bank, and I have the honor to present in 5 points the reforms that I would like to implement if appointed to this position. I – Expansion of the Executive Board from 3…
“With a more independent profile like Michel Santi’s, we start to imagine other possibilities.” Quelle BNS voulons-nous et qui devrait la diriger? L’heure est venue pour la BNS d’en finir avec la gouvernance opaque. Le futur de la BNS doit se conjuguer avec les intérêts des citoyens et des entreprises suisses, estime notre chroniqueuse Myret…
Inflation? What inflation? It was fundamentally influenced by supply-related factors: disruptions in the supply chain, energy, and food. Not by factors related to a surge in demand… precisely because our middle classes and our poor are forced to limit their standard of living due to inadequate policies, and a multitude of asymmetric shocks that have…
4 years after the Great Recession of 2007-2009, the United States had recovered 4 million jobs. 4 years after the pandemic, they now recover 6 million jobs, thanks to the massive fiscal stimuli implemented by the Biden administration. Europe, for its part, as usual, stagnates, vegetates. Wait: unless it tries to follow the United States,…
Gold prices, XAU/JPY. Gold shatters all records, silently. Pay attention as gold is sending us a message.
The global low fertility crisis strikes at the heart of scientific and technological progress. Why? It is precisely the places with the highest innovation that are hit hardest. South Korea has both the highest innovation and lowest fertility rates in the world.
The port of Baltimore was significant in US vehicle imports. «Predictability: Does the Flap of a Butterfly’s Wings in Brazil Set off a Tornado in Texas?», Edward Lorenz, 1972 Globalization or not globalization? As the Swiss say, you can’t have the butter and the money from the butter…
Since mid-2022, real estate prices in the United States have dropped by an average of 20%, compared to a total of 23% during the cataclysmic subprime crisis. It was 23% at the time from 2007 to 2010, whereas we’re dealing with a 20% decline over 20 months now. This would suggest that the collapse is…
This is striking! The energy crisis of 2022 has been the worst economic crisis in Germany since WWII when looking at the decline of real wages. The increase in the price level is very likely permanent – those with savings have unexpectedly lost some of their purchasing power. The real estate owners (upper middle class)…
It’s always the same eternal questions that torment us when a bubble bursts and wreaks havoc on human, economic, and ecological fronts: How did we get here? What happened? Our world finds itself today in a critical situation with few historical precedents because we are now all hostages to multiple and repetitive bubbles. There’s the…
How can we forget the cult British series from the 60s, The Prisoner, where a terrifying bubble relentlessly pursued the hero played by the charismatic Patrick McGoohan? Our world finds itself in a similar situation because we are now all hostages to bubbles. From the bubble that isolates the rulers, to the bubble of the…
The German Finance Minister, Lindner, a great strategist in the eyes of the Almighty, announces the implementation of an austerity plan consisting of reducing public spending by 30 billion in 2025… thus condemning his country and the rest of Europe to assured recession. A recession occurs when a state is suddenly gripped by the desire…
The 2008 financial crisis marked a decisive turning point in the Chinese economy: adverse effects of which are still being felt today. Fearing contagion that would affect their banking system and the detrimental consequences of a decline in exports due to the slowdown in global demand, Chinese officials believed—following the path laid out by the…
“The Ruble has collapsed. The Russian stock market closed due to fears of capital flight. Interest rates have more than doubled. Credit rating agencies have significantly downgraded Russia.” These were essentially the statements made by Antony Blinken, US Secretary of State, echoing the sentiments of Western officials who were counting on “massive and unprecedented consequences”…
The most serious economic mistake of Germany in the last 20 years. Celebrated at the time as a victory for fiscal and budgetary discipline, breaking away from the carelessness attributed to the vast majority of European Union members strongly encouraged to follow suit. Engraved in the marble of the Constitution. Today, German politicians no longer…
Several countries have decided to stop using their own currency and instead adopt the US dollar as the standard for exchanges. For some poorly managed economies plagued by corruption, abandoning the national currency is often a last resort before total collapse. Westerners often fail to realize the endless complications and hardships caused by a currency…
In 2021, researchers Hannes Weber and Richard Cincotta theorized that countries with a median age of 25 or younger among their citizens are more prone to revolutions. Previous studies had already established a correlation between a young demographic and a higher risk of war or political violence. Data from the 1990s revealed that countries where…
Tough times for those who thought, with naive enthusiasm, that the staggering sums poured by our states to facilitate the carbon transition would all be used wisely. What can now be referred to as green scandals have been occurring for some time, reflecting—or as a consequence of—governments engaging in a real race to spend the…
The movement is unstoppable. In the same week, King Charles expresses regrets for the British colonial violence committed in Kenya, and German President Steinmeier apologizes to Tanzania for the atrocities committed by Germans. The question is burning: will European countries now be forced to allocate a portion of their taxpayers’ funds to substantially compensate the…
Sanctions are a lever frequently employed, certainly because it allows the rulers who use and abuse them to avoid costly armed conflicts. Sanctions represent a kind of “low-cost” warfare. Not quite, in reality, because these retaliatory measures against a state – far from harming its officials – primarily punish the most vulnerable under the yoke…
In Beijing, it’s the revolt of the elderly! Those who have led the Communist Party, these former leaders who presided over and orchestrated China’s rise to power until Xi’s accession, are now demanding accountability. It has recently come to light that they gathered in late August in the Hebei Province, specifically in the coastal city…
China has become one of the most expensive countries in the world to raise and support a family. The collapse of consumption and overall living standards is wreaking havoc among young Chinese couples, who now have little motivation to start a family. Chinese fertility is declining rapidly despite the pro-natalist policy adopted by the government…
The flour war in 1775 sparked around 300 riots throughout France and was caused by the state’s abolition of price controls on bread, driven by Turgot’s influence. Turgot, who had elevated “laissez-faire” as an economic principle almost akin to divine law or inherent in natural laws, had not at all concerned himself with the rising…
Clearly, for Russia, it was a chronicle of an announced debacle. They invaded the largest country in Europe with barely 150,000 soldiers, while the USSR mobilized nearly a million men in 1968 to occupy a country (Czechoslovakia) that represented only one-fifth of Ukraine’s territory and a quarter of its population at that time. Stalin would…
It is necessary to conjugate the striking force of OPEC in the past. This group of countries that used to meet in Vienna, deciding unanimously to reduce their production and using their monopoly to drive up oil prices to the detriment of nations and continents eager to consume it, no longer impresses much. How distant…
Is it time to doubt the American economy, known for its dynamism? Is its financial system still as resilient in the face of challenges? Is its democratic architecture characterized by the famous “checks and balances” still functional? Not a day goes by without a nation outside its bloc announcing a measure, at the very least…
The first “Sharia-compliant” obligation dates back to the Ottoman Empire in 1775. In 2004, Germans were the first Europeans to issue a “sukuk,” an Islamic bond that attracted investors from the Gulf, Saudi Arabia, Malaysia, the United States, Japan, and Hong Kong. This instrument was specifically an “ijarah,” a vehicle that aimed to collect rents…
How not to be shocked by the near-economic disappearance of Europe? The “acceleration of the European economy” mentioned by Emmanuel Macron in China this April is a tale that no longer comforts or deceives anyone. Readers: your first electric car will most likely be Chinese, as China has now surpassed Germany as the world’s second-largest…
All the economic parishes agree on the fact that too high debts are harmful. However, they diverge when the profile of the debtor is considered because, while the Austrian school is primarily concerned with public debts, the neo-Keynesians attach much more importance to private sector debts. The classics are indeed indifferent to the debts of…
In the CS rescue operation, the Confederation, the SNB and the regulator (Finma) took a decision with serious consequences: to sacrifice Tier 1 bonds, nicknamed “CoCo bonds” or “contingent convertible bonds”. These are hybrid securities between capital and debt, of better quality and which take precedence over equities, a sort of first mortgage. The authorities…
Credit Suisse fines by Year: 2022: $700 million 2021: $280 million 2018: $90 million 2017: $5.4 billion 2016: $240 million 2014: $3.7 billion 2012: $120 million 2009: $536 million 2008: $15 million 2003: $275 million 2002: $350 million Credit Suisse has been fined over 50 times for a total of $11.4 billion since…
We live in a great time when Credit Suisse is about to be sold to UBS at 1 billion, when its market capitalization exceeded 90 billion in 2007! In 2022 alone, CS’s stock has collapsed by 75%. This is the period of wild sales because 1 billion would be paid by…
The stars align. The potential for severe turbulence that will affect both the financial system and the budgetary stability of many States has never been so high. There are far too many indicators that warn of extreme fragility because the addition of corporate, household and government debt continues to worsen. While all of…
Eurozone supercore inflation is at 6.0% and is by no means peaking. In Japan, inflation increased by 4.4% in January compared to January 2022: strongest annual inflationary surge since 1981! In the USA, inflation was at 7% for January, and revised upwards for the 4th quarter of 2022. Very disturbing, these figures show that…
The gold standard was a system where the currency of a country was linked to gold and which could materialize either by defining a certain quantity of metal in exchange for the American dollar, or indirectly through currencies having a fixed parity against the greenback. As early as 1944 with Bretton Woods, only central…
US growth under its various Presidents The % of US Republican officials who believe their country gives too much to Ukraine is steadily increasing
The loyalty programs of aviation companies (frequent flyer program) are 40 years old. They were first created in 1979 by the now defunct Texas International Airlines. Eager to give impetus to its stagnant clientele and to give luster to its brand, the solution advocated – and followed little by little by others – was…
While it has been THE fundamental source of deflation for the past 20 years, China will now export inflation. This country locked up for 2 years nearly 19% of the universal population that were prevented from consuming. This 1.4 billion individual now liberated will rush to buy, go out, live… with the global inflationary…
Sales of electric cars are exploding on a global scale. Last year saw an increase of 60% compared to 2021 with nearly 11 million vehicles put into circulation. It’s simple: EV now account for 13.2% of all global sales, having thus tripled in 2 years since 2020. Germany, Great Britain, France and China are…
This phenomenon occurs quite rarely, always in the event of liquidity crises, i.e. in times of great financial stress such as in 2008 or at the start of the Covid crisis. It translates into a gluttonous appetite for the US dollar sought after by the entire planet because it is sorely lacking. It is…
In China, for 3 years now the propagandist machine has been calling the West a liar and incompetent in the face of its management of Covid, literally demonizing Western vaccines described as counterproductive. You have to understand why China has opened up suddenly in recent days by removing all coercive health measures. It was…
The United States is not wrong to support Ukraine because a Russian defeat is in their interest. However, the American and Ukrainian objectives do not quite coincide because the USA has achieved theirs while the Ukrainians have not yet. Therefore, the former are eager to bring Russia back to the negotiating table when the…
346 interest rate hikes have taken place to date around the world, an absolute record since the 1980s ! The only weapon to counter inflation is for the key rate of a central bank to exceed the rate of inflation by around 150 basis points, knowing that this rate must be maintained at these…
Real estate storm to come in Germany where residential construction is plunging at the same rate as mortgage applications.
Breakdown of GDP in the world: Interesting to compare with the breakdown of populations around the world:
The United States spend 860 billion $/year on their armaments but… are not the biggest spenders in relation to their GDP!
