Salient to Investors: Currency trading suggests traders are dismissing the prospect of an upset “yes” in the September 18 referendum on Scottish independence. Strategists say the pound’s peaks and troughs in 2014 reflect the prospect of the BOE becoming one of the first major central banks to raise rates. Geoffrey Yu
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Joseph Stiglitz at Columbia said: Euro-area austerity policies have been a dismal failure as growth grinds to a halt. Monetary policy cannot substitute for fiscal union – construction of a European banking union is too slow. Mutualization of euro-area debt – rejected by Germany and others – would
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Philip Vermeulen at ECB and Gabriel Zucman at London School of Economics said the wealth of the super-affluent is undercounted because of tax shelters and non-responses to questionnaires. Zucman said the top 0.1% of Americans with at least $20 million in net wealth owned 23.5% of all US
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: William Pesek writes: If there were ever proof that ex-PM Julia Gillard was not defeated for her performance, this election campaign is it – Abbott and PM Kevin Rudd have offered nothing new or insightful to voters, and neither have come up with a plan to redefine Australia’s economy
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Kenneth Rogoff at Harvard said: Janet Yellen and Lawrence Summers qualify to replace Bernanke because of their dovishness about placing too much weight on stable inflation when unemployment is far above its longer-run level. Aggressive monetary stimulus is needed, even at the cost of moderate price increases, because with weak
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Nobel laureate Joseph Stiglitz said it is premature for the Fed to reduce monetary stimulus despite little evidence it has helped the economy, which is not back to normal. Stiglitz said the stimulus may have contributed to asset price bubbles and to a weaker dollar. Zhu Min at the
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Joseph Stiglitz said: The richest 1% of Americans have doubled their wealth since 1980 and now hold 25% of the country’s wealth, yet the median income level in the US had not changed since the early 1990s. The American dream has gone: the US has one of the worst
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Unemployment in the 17-nation euro region rose to 11.6 percent from 11.5 percent in August, the highest since data started in 1995. Youth unemployment is at 23.3 percent. Christoph Weil at Commerzbank is now more pessimistic, saying the euro-area economy will only return to growth in Q2 2013 and the jobless rate will increase
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Greece accounts for just 2.3 percent of EU GDP, and 4.3 percent of EU debt. Without Greece , the EU would have had a trade surplus in 2011. Germany has posted a trade surplus every month since May 1991 and has avoided recession since 2009. OECD says the euro is undervalued
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