“I recently spoke with experts at the International Monetary Fund, who put the problem bluntly: China is simply too big to keep exporting its way out of its own internal malaise.” @Lingling_Wei https://t.co/nsBIj0UbEq
Last week, we published a report titled “How Is China Rewiring Its Trillion-Dollar Surplus?” in response to media reports that Chinese authorities have urged banks to curb their exposure to the US Treasury market. This regulatory signal is highly investment-relevant,...

It takes two incomes to buy a house in modern America, with last year having another sharp increase. Chartbook Top Links of the day is here: https://t.co/Up3SU7RW5f

Turkey's "core" current account deficit (blue) has widened back out to levels that exceed where it was before the 2018 "sudden stop" and the catastrophic post-COVID years. Turkey is back in the danger zone. Rebalancing can't happen with Erdogan in...
The U.S. administration did not send a single representative to the official commemoration events marking the anniversary of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, nor did it issue a single word through its embassy in Kyiv -- not even a standard...

Yen Slides on a Double Whammy: The US dollar is mostly slightly firmer against the most of the G10 currencies but largely confined to its recent ranges. The yen is the notable exception. Beijing announced it is sanctioning more Japanese...

The $USD is mostly little changed. The focus is on $JPY. Beijing stepped up export restrictions to ostensibly curb Tokyo's remilitarization and PM Takaichi reported pressed BOJ harder not to raise rates. See https://t.co/kOoSATxYUA https://t.co/1osffkrwvk
Japan has identified a large rare earth deposit of its own, but it's not going to change global supply dynamics. Here's the situation... #rareearths #japan #geopolitics https://t.co/2WX7oeO6Jm

Is Copper a Prudent Short? Next to its industrial commodity and inflation companions -- iron ore, Brent crude oil and Chinese Government 10-year Bond yields (CGBs) -- copper might be too hot. From a base of 100, starting with our iron...

TANKER RATES for chartering vessels to carry crude (or other dirty products such as fuel oil) have surged to the highest for more than three years as the United States and Iran edge towards war. The Baltic Exchange dirty tanker...

The number of core goods in the PCE basket with >2% inflation is clearly on the rise https://t.co/zfnw5c3Qnr

Norway central bank seen delaying the next rate cut to the 3rd quarter https://t.co/DQxoj354TR via @ottummelas https://t.co/jKYdw66YUF

#IndiaWatch 🇮🇳: While the US builds tariff walls, India opens doors. India has just revised its tax treaty with France and lowered dividend taxes for investors. https://t.co/CWxHPKVvRY
Huawei’s revenues surge to US$127 billion as it continues to defy US sanctions Wait, thought controls were "working"?... https://t.co/fueavLdQgI

The U.S. Government can’t operate without it. Global economy can’t function without it. And Wall Street can’t trade without it. Yet most people have no idea what BlackRock actually does. Here’s how BlackRock built a $10 trillion empire that quietly controls everything:
EUR/USD neutral; testing 50‑day SMA/61.8% fib at 1.1769. Momentum weak after brief post‑SCOTUS dollar selloff; tariff uncertainty persists. Insight: short below 50‑day SMA to 1.1670–1.1650. — Viktor Kopylov, PhD, CFA More insights: t.me/si14Kopylov

In the aftermath of Trump’s new 15% tariffs, the UK threatens it will RETALIATE. TRUMP’S TARIFFS = BACKFIRE. https://t.co/k7gyK9spmB
China Hits Japanese Firms With Export Bans—Move marks another escalation in economic campaign against Japan over prime minister’s Taiwan comment @wsj_douglasj https://t.co/KP8DkI7RD5 https://t.co/KP8DkI7RD5

#TurkeyWatch 🇹🇷: Turkey's main stock index, the BIST 100, is up nearly 24% YTD, and foreign investors are piling into Turkish bonds and equities. Turkey's disinflation story is gaining credibility and capital is flowing in. BEWARE. TURKEY'S MONETARY POLICY REMAINS TOO LOOSE. https://t.co/ubNTzVl6KH
Setser: "$100b a month is a large sum, it had to go into a fairly liquid corner of the market". And of course if on top of this China really were reducing its exposure to USD assets, we would need more...

European auto sales fall even as EV demand cushions the drop https://t.co/MRYjYElcs2 via @MonicaRaymunt https://t.co/fVEMCkDkcZ
SCMP: "Consumer spending during China’s Lunar New Year rose modestly this year, according to early official data, as authorities extended the holiday and stepped up stimulus measures to support domestic demand." https://t.co/d5LzFaVd4V via @scmpnews
The irony is that to reduce trade imbalances, tariffs should mostly substitute for currency devaluation, in which case a single, universal tariff is likely to be far more effective than a hodgepodge of bilateral and sectoral tariffs. https://t.co/QVpoGNLwuH

So no more dedollarization of China's formal reserves if the US softens its Taiwan policy? Tis an option that China is at least considering per Lingling Wei and the WSJ 1/ https://t.co/365Y8wHJV4

Memo to self: file under unintended consequences. ✍️ @ft “The tariff structure puts all countries on an equal footing. . 💥”But parity with China is not necessarily good news.” For other countries 🎩📈 @SimonEvenett @IMD_Bschool https://t.co/OCibAcj1Ms
1/4 As this WSJ article points out, countries are keeping their exports competitive in the face of US tariffs by increasingly subsidizing them, with the subsidies ultimately being paid for in the form of suppressed consumption. https://t.co/phOREv8G8z
🔴This is one of the WORST starts for the S&P 500 to the year in HISTORY: S&P 500 is lagging the rest of the world equities by 8 percentage points, the worst start to a year in at least 17 years. The...

PM Takaichi sticks with Japan's one-sided trade agreement with the US. India’s PM Modi has wisely not signed a trade agreement with Uncle Sam. INDIA LEAVES JAPAN IN THE DUST. https://t.co/aWVetL1q0z
1/7 Reuters: "China's biggest solar firms shed nearly one-third of their workforces last year, company filings show, as one of the industries hand-picked by Beijing to drive economic growth grapples with falling prices and steep losses." https://t.co/BDS9UWJaXO
Good PIIE paper by Tamim Bayoumi and Joseph E. Gagnon on the consequences of accelerating trade imbalances. They warn that trade tensions are likely to get worse, something I have been saying for years and continue to say. I don't...

#IndiaWatch 🇮🇳: At the margin, the world is making a Pivot away towards India. TRUMP’S TARIFFS = MAKING LOTS OF US ENEMIES. https://t.co/3H8maAoa62
A little more complicated -- China consistently buys more fx when the CNY is appreciating (whether for structural or cyclical reasons). Exports start converting, and controlling the pace of appreciation takes intervention. Subtle point, but clear in the data
Bloomberg is still arguing “oil glut” & saying the correlation between geopolitics in the Middle East & oil prices is "broken" How can @bbgoriginals be 6 months behind the curve & still be in the news business? #Oil #EnergyMarkets #Geopolitics #Commodities...
The shadow oil fleet isn’t gone — it’s under stress Seizures raise costs & strand barrels, but doing more against Russian & Iranian flows means higher oil prices & inflation https://t.co/P5EDN7PrRY #Oil #Sanctions #EnergySecurity #Russia #Iran #Geopolitics
A Mexican civil war would be far more catastrophic to American supply chains than tariffs - Michael Vincent
The probability weighted average of both @jasonfurman and the survey average is 2.3%*, i.e. solid breakout. That's bullish; CBO is at 1.8%. *(Assumes 5% for the >4% phase transition scenario. I figure probabilities of higher figures quickly fall to...

Japan’s big bet on the U.S. housing market got even bigger today Japanese builders are rapidly acquiring U.S. homebuilders—now Daiwa House is buying United Homes That's just 10 days after Japan-based Sumitomo Forestry said it's buying Tri Point Homes https://t.co/UnPOshRdS1

Today, Trump issued a statement on Truth Social saying "any country that wants to play games with the ridiculous Supreme Court decision... will be met with a much higher tariff." THE TARIFF MAN HAS LOST IT. https://t.co/AA365cmzVQ

Trump's 10% global tariff was formalized in a proclamation from Friday and goes into effect at midnight tonight. He later said he would raise it to 15% but with three hours to go, is yet to do anything formal to...

Section 122 tariffs now being collected at 10%, not Trump's weekend 15%. Clearly, a well-oiled tariff machine here. 🤷🤷 https://t.co/5MjbcrZuXD https://t.co/jb72H2AZQ8

Me, in the Financial Times -- On the surge in China's intervention, and the impossibility of diversifying away from dollar assets/ Treasuries when the state banks are buying $100b a month in FX 1/ https://t.co/Pc78czuld9

After financial commitments fell through, the German government pours €1.3 BILLION into Salzgitter’s green steel project. GERMANY'S GREEN SECULAR RELIGION = KILLING THE GERMAN ECONOMY. https://t.co/gmESJ38qxH
Interesting on many levels. Bessent is much more of a trader (and yet also much more political) than most Treasury secretaries ... https://t.co/7m06uOU5eQ

2025 delivered the weakest U.S. job growth of any non-recession year in decades. The US job market is NOT as hot as the spinmeister in chief Washington DC cracks it up to be. https://t.co/8bDuyzl0yp
Trump tariff vendetta picking up. Will all this go to the courts? Supply chain uncertainty.
US House not likely to codify Trump’s 15% tariff. So the tariff will expire after 150 days. What will Trump do then? More Trump unpredictability for supply chains?
Inflation is a regressive tax on the poorest people in society, since they only hold cash. Once people have wealth, they can afford and get access to inflation-resistant asset classes (stocks, bitcoin, real estate, etc). Expanding financial access and opportunities globally to...
If the unemployment rate hits 6% with stocks down 25-30% (roughly the thresholds when we got TARP/CARES Act), we’ll get a big fiscal policy response. But it won’t be actual TARP or CARES, it depends on what the crisis looks...

The S&P 500 looks calm, but look under the hood. Software stocks are DOWN ~30%. Defaults are CLIMBING. Private credit is AT RISK. https://t.co/qJPf95n11Z

The BofA fund manager survey has never been this bearish on the dollar. It is time to bite your lip and start being a lonely dollar long. I have a sample size of one here, arguably a sample size of...