Tag: Rate Increase

A Pivotal Juncture for Gold

Posted on by Gary Tanashian

With FOMC on tap with an upcoming .5% rate hike, gold got hammered and bounced back with a vengeance on ‘CPI’ Friday. The Fed will raise the Funds Rate at least .5% next week. So says not me, but the wise guys whose job it is to correctly anticipate FOMC policy. Indeed, a full 20% of CME traders expect .75%, up from our last check on June 3.

Meanwhile, the gold price (futures) was unceremoniously shoved below the daily chart’s SMA 200 before pulling its bounce back routine on CPI Friday. Check out that reversal volume. This is notable stuff and with FOMC in the wings, it is doubly so.

To NFTRH, unlike many gold/commodity observers, gold is far different from the other inflated stuff. It has far more counter-cyclical aspects to it than copper, industrial materials, energy commodities and even to a degree, silver. Continue reading "A Pivotal Juncture for Gold" →

Time For The Fed To Take It Easy

Posted on by Lior Alkalay

Lior Alkalay - INO.com Contributor


The Fed’s June rate decision is coming up this week and the consensus bets are overwhelmingly tilting towards a rate hike. According to the CBOE Fed Funds rate probability chart, the probability the Fed will raise rates at the next meeting is 91.3%. Thus, suggesting that market participants are almost certain a rate hike is coming. Furthermore, there is also growing consensus that the Fed will also start trimming its balance sheet as early September. However, a deep dive into the mechanics of the US economy suggests that the Fed should ignore the consensus, and even its own outlook, and take a step back from tightening. And it all starts with the puzzling discrepancy between inflation and housing prices.

Home Prices Heat as Inflation Cools

Upon the surface, the latest fall in the US Core inflation rate, from 2.3%, four months ago to 1.9%, and the latest surge in US housing prices (as reflected by the Case-Shiller Index) present a somewhat puzzling divergence between the US inflation outlook and housing prices. Nonetheless, those two contradicting developments are closely intertwined, both to each other and to the Fed’s monetary policy. And, to illustrate the link between the two, we must dive into the US Treasury market. Continue reading "Time For The Fed To Take It Easy" →