Free Republic

For years central banks had been keeping rates near 0%, or below, and at the same time printing over a hundred billion dollars’ worth of fiat currencies each and every month to purchase bonds and stocks. That is all changing now. ... fourteen major global central banks are either in the process right now, or have indicated that they be will next year, in the process of raising interest rates. At the same time, QE on a global net basis will plunge from $180 billion per month at its peak during 2017, to $0 by December…and will then go negative...

The price of a can of Coca-Cola? Likely going up. A package of Pampers? That too. Plane tickets? They also may be more expensive. These items and more may cost more in the coming months as people start feeling the effects of higher fuel prices and raw-material costs as well as a range of tariffs. Janette Hendricks said she has noticed higher prices on “just about everything” in the past three months or so. That’s put a little pressure on the recently retired nurse in Washington. So she goes shopping less often, “makes things stretch,” and she always shops for...

"The GDPNow model estimate for real GDP growth (seasonally adjusted annual rate) in the second quarter of 2018 is 4.5 percent on June 27, down from 4.7 percent on June 19," the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta said in its latest GDPNow report. Key quotes The nowcast of real residential investment growth declined from 2.9 percent to 0.6 percent after the existing-home sales release from the National Association of Realtors on Wednesday, June 20, and the U.S. Census Bureau's releases on new-home sales and costs on Monday, June 25. After this morning's advance releases on durable manufacturing, inventories, and international...

The Federal Reserve hiked its benchmark short-term interest rate a quarter percentage point Wednesday and indicated that two more increases are likely in store ahead. The move pushes the funds rate target to 1.75 percent to 2 percent. The rate is closely tied to consumer debt, particularly credit cards, home equity lines of credit and other adjustable-rate instruments. In an unusually terse statement that ran just 320 words, the Federal Open Market Committee changed multiple phrases from its previous missives, pointing to a more optimistic view on economic growth and higher inflation expectations.

The U.S. economy is expanding at a 4.8 percent annualized rate in the second quarter, the Atlanta Federal Reserve’s GDPNow forecast model showed on Friday. The forecast has been climbing higher following the release of a series of good economic data. On May 25, the measure foresaw four percent GDP growth. This rose to 4.7 percent Thursday and ticked even higher on Friday following the better than expected jobs report for May. The Atlanta Fed forecasts a big boost in private sector fixed investment, which includes capital investment in machinery, land, buildings, vehicles, and technology. Earlier, the Atlanta Fed saw...

Back in March 2010 I published an article titled 'Will Globalists Trigger Yet Another World War?' under the pen name Giordano Bruno describing what I felt would be the most effective triggers for a new global conflict. In that article I pointed to Syria as the primary powder keg, followed in close second by Iran and Yemen. This was written well before the Syrian civil war was engineered by establishment interests. I focused on potential false flags that could be used as a rationale by the U.S. or Israel to invade the region, thereby giving Russia and China reason...

Traders work on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) on March 23, 2018 in New York City. Stocks plunge more than 500 points 47 Mins Ago | 02:18 Stocks fell sharply on Friday as worries of a trade war brewing between the U.S. and China grew. Wall Street also digested disappointing employment data. The Dow Jones industrial average fell 740 points, with Boeing and Caterpillar as the biggest decliners in the index. The S&P 500 declined more than 2.5 percent, with industrials as the worst-performing sector. The Nasdaq composite dropped 2.7 percent. The sell-off accelerated in the...

WOW! How to start? Let me try this: I once heard a presentation by a man who'd spent 20 years in the visual media business. I was shocked to learn that his experience with the Generation Xers and Millennials is as follows: * Most of them DO NOT READ BOOKS but get their information from their electronic devices (smart phones, tablets, computers). * If something they “click” on doesn't grab their attention in the first 8 seconds, THEY'RE GONE! * Even if they're “hooked” in those first 8 seconds, most of them will TUNE OUT if it runs much over...

Join us for all the news and analysis of the Federal Reserve’s interest-rate decision and economic projections Wednesday, along with Jerome Powell’s first press conference as chairman.

This thread is a friendly collaborative place for FReepers to analyze information and share opinons. FReepers have a wide variety of reasons for investigating Q Anon content; this is not the appropriate place to criticize or badger those who choose to use some of their time in this manner. This thread is a continuation of the prior Q Anon thread located here: http://freerepublic.com/focus/chat/3636549/posts I plan to post one thread at a time and ping new drops posted to it. The current schedule is to post new threads Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. When I post each (new) thread, the prior thread...

Jerry Powell apparently doesn’t get it. The new head of the Federal Reserve isn’t supposed to imply that he doesn’t work for Wall Street. And he’s not supposed to say, as he did the other day in front of Congress, that “we don’t manage the stock market — we manage stable prices and maximum employment.” That’s not what Wall Street and the stock market want to hear. And that was proven by the fact that the stock market dropped sharply on Tuesday when Powell was speaking. And Powell’s comments were one of the reasons Wall Street’s pros couldn’t get a...

Federal Reserve chair Jerome Powell moved markets on Tuesday in his first appearance before lawmakers on Capitol Hill since his confirmation. In response to questions from Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-NY), Powell hinted that more aggressive action on raising interest rates from the Fed could be warranted this year. “At the December meeting, the median [FOMC] participant called for three rate increases in 2018,” Powell said. “Now since then, what we’ve seen is incoming data that suggests a strengthening in the economy.” Following this comment, stocks — which had been higher as Powell began speaking and answering questions — moved lower...

The pullback in stocks the past two trading days is both long overdue and healthful. But after nearly a decade of easy money engineered by the Fed and other central banks, is the sell-off in the bond market simply a short-term tantrum? Or is it the start of a secular bear market in bonds, due to higher inflation, that can only end in tears? If one thinks about interest rates as simply the price of money, one could argue that the correction in stock prices would be more worrisome if accompanied by significantly lower bond yields than higher ones. In...

Billionaire investor Carl Icahn spoke to CNBC via telephone this morning and had some very ominous warnings after what he has seen in the last few days. Reflecting on the market’s moves recently, Icahn shocked the anchors by saying: “This is something we’ve never seen before… I don’t remember ever seeing a market with this kind of volatility over two weeks.“ “The market has become a much more dangerous place [due to index funds and ETFs]… it’s like 2008 where everyone was buying mortgages and CDS.” Concluding that: “Passive investing is the bubble right now.” “There is going to be...

* The Atlanta Fed's GDPNow model forecasts 5.4% gross domestic product-growth in the first quarter. * That's much higher than what even the most bullish economists expect, but is based on only one month's worth of data for the quarter. * Many economists expect the economy to grow closer to 2.5% through 2019. One model that forecasts the US economy's performance could shock even President Donald Trump if it ends up being accurate. The Atlanta Federal Reserve's GDPNow model projects that gross domestic product would increase at a 5.4% annualized rate in the first quarter. The last time the economy...

Dow took a dive on Tuesday, plunging 400 points, thus marking its biggest point drop since 2016, when it fell 610 points in June. Due to investors’ fears of higher than expected inflation, the 10 year Treasury yield traded near levels not since since 2014. On Tuesday, the S&P 500 fell 1.2%, the Dow Industrial Average pulled back 400 points, while the NASDAQ composite lost 1.1%. This is the second day in a row US stocks traded significantly lower than expected, marking the first big selloff of 2018. On Monday, the DOW lost 177 points due to the rise in...

How much inflation are we really seeing today, and is it likely to rise further as the Fed “unwinds” its Quantitative Easing securities purchases, and a more active economy pushes up wages and prices? Free Market Central put these questions to economist John Williams, whose ShadowStats alternative economic indicators are featured on our home page. Williams has long insisted that federal economic statistics do not tell the whole story. For years, he explains, the government has been gaming the numbers. Not only is inflation understated; given current trends, it’s only going to get worse.

Remember the case of the Census worker who was found hanging from a tree with the word ‘fed' scrawled across his chest? You remember - he died at the hands of right-wing commentators and anti-government tea partiers. He was killed because of an overwhelming case of right-wing paranoia. He was murdered by Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, Michelle Bachmann, and Fox News. Keep this quiet though... While the death of Bill Sparkman was a media sensation for pushing anti-conservative sentiments just a couple of months ago, it is receiving little to no coverage currently. Why? Because, as investigators have recently speculated,...

In 2009, the federal government decided to take property from Kevin Brott and other landowners in Michigan for a recreational trail. That was done under the Trails Act, which allows the government to turn abandoned railroad lines into hiking trails. There is nothing inherently wrong in that, but under the Fifth Amendment, whenever government takes private property for public use, it is required to pay the owners just compensation. The problem is that under federal statute (the Tucker Act), property owners are only allowed to submit their claims for compensation to the Court of Federal Claims (CFC) if the amount...

With Congress wrestling over a tax reform plan that critics say would explode the government budget deficit, Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen said she also is concerned over the surging level of public debt. A Senate committee passed the GOP-sponsored proposal, which would slash the corporate tax rate and lower individual income rates for many Americans.However, the price tag of the plan is in the area of $1.5 trillion at a time when the Congressional Budget Official already is projecting a deficit of more than $1 trillion in the years ahead and with the total debt level at $20.6 trillion...