Posted on 11/26/2023 9:51:54 PM PST by SeekAndFind
The 10-year Treasury yield set off roaring alarms about the U.S. budget when it surged to 5% last month. Now those warnings look like a fire drill. Federal Reserve rate hikes seem to be over for now, giving the bond market a reprieve and allowing a powerful S&P 500 rally to resume.
Enjoy it while it lasts. The next debt scare may be the real thing, and it could rock the U.S. economy and stock market.
Here's why: The Fed's historic turnabout, from enabling massive budget deficits to directing the sharpest rate hikes in 40 years, has seemingly broken the budget. Treasury market stress is almost certain to return.
The era of Fed quantitative easing and near-zero interest rates promoted carefree fiscal policies that led the U.S. to rack up $20 trillion in federal debt since 2008 financial crisis.
The Federal Reserve's fingerprints are all over the red ink. After the Fed sent more than $100 billion in interest on its bond portfolio to the Treasury in fiscal 2022, it had to halt those payments last year as bond prices fell. Having let inflation get out of the bag, an 8.7% cost-of-living adjustment stoked a $134 billion increase in Social Security checks.
Another roughly $100 billion went to FDIC bailouts, as banks like Silicon Valley Bank that loaded up on Treasuries when rates were ultralow became insolvent when Treasury yields surged.
(Excerpt) Read more at investors.com ...
There is no comfortable way out. The comfortable way out died out around 2005 or so. Then, we could have cut the deficit to zero and not really notice any changes.
George W Bush was nation-building back then
There were articles about him borrowing money from China
But I have not seen them since then 🤷♂️🤷♀️🤷🤷♂️🤷♀️
“About $8 trillion worth of debt held by the public is set to mature over the next year. The Treasury will have to reissue that sum.”
Why re-issue?
(About $8 trillion worth of debt held by the public is set to mature over the next year)
Oh good. WHAT could possibly go wrong?
THIS is why they want World War III. /shiny side out
Oh, and Joe Biden’s corruption
There was no political will to do anything about it. In retrospect, we should have raised the retirement age to collect Social Securtiy to 66 for everyone starting in 2020. Then every year after that, we'll raise it by a month. Eventually, we'll stop at around 70. So all of this will be gradual. We could have done it. But the Democrats are always going to play politics. So we'll just kick the can down the road.
The government and the Federal Reserve keep kicking the can forward to the next generation. For as much as I dislike Bill Clinton I have to recognize that he was the only one that actually did something about the federal deficit. At some point the US money will be as worthless as monopoly money and our children will have to deal with a terrible depression.
Thank Newton McPherson.
1) To fund the extra government spending, the Treasury Department will have to issue more bonds.
2) The problem is there isn't an unlimited appetite for our debt, so rates will have to increase.
3) Higher rates will slow the economy.
4) A slower economy means less tax revenue and more money spent on social programs so people aren't destitute. Go back to 1)
At some point the Fed will end up buying up our debt, but that might be a while down the road, and we can have a depression in the mean time.
Remember.....Trump has NEVER called for a balanced budget.
Good article. Thanks for sharing.
You know the old saing that figures don’t lie, but liars figure. It applies here.
First, look at total revenue in these calculations. It is inflated by including Social Security and medicare taxes that are not general fund revenues. These taxes are between 30% to 40% of the total, depending upon year.
Furthermore, Social Security pays more out in annual benefits than it collects in taxes. Thus the general fund must make up the difference by repaying some of the money they borrowed in previous years. A net outlay, not a revenue.
THERE ARE NO SOCIAL SECURITY TRUST FUNDS. The reserve funds to pay Social Security benefits has all been loaned to the general fund and spent. Social Security is holding IOU’s from the General Fund.
We are a house of cards that is beyond bankrupt. A close examination of the year end US Treasury financial statements for the last year ending September 30th 2023 reveals that the books were cooked by accelerating revenues and delaying expenditures. Those delayed expenditures were the reason the debt skyrocketed in October to pay the delayed bills.
It goes far beyond this. It even goes far beyond the unfunded liabilities to include loan guarantees. For example, the Federal Mortgage companies have borrowed short term to lend long term at very low mortgage rates. This is agency debt, not included in our national debt, but guaranteed by the USA.
Currently they are refinancing these short term bonds at rates greater than they are collecting on the low interest mortgages. When this bubble bursts, along with the FDIC bailout, the USA is toast. Burnt toast.
Bfl
thats the way ponzi schemes work
you always need new suckers
Reissue and print more fiat currency. A never ending circle. We’re never in trouble if they can just print more money 🙄
toon didn’t do a damn thing about the budget deficit....he initially had a rat congress but for most of his regime he had a solid pub congress to go up against, thank God....
well as long as you’re going to make SS people wait til age 66 or 70 to start collecting, I’m sure you’ll apply that to all the military and federal/county /state govt workers now won’t you?...as it is, we have people “retiring” after 20 yrs and collecting big money....but SS is the real culprit/s/
and besides, many people have easy desk jobs and don’t have the damaged joints from constant physical work but you would expect them to keep working til age 70.....right...
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