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Bubbles, Bubbles Everywhere
by John Mauldin of Mauldin Economics, 8/16/14
You can almost feel it in the air. The froth and foam on markets of all shapes and sizes all over the world. Its exhilarating, and the pundits who populate the media outlets are bubbling over. Theres nothing like a rising market to lift our moods. Unless of course, as Prof. Kindleberger famously cautioned (see below), we are not participating in that rising market. Then we feel like losers. But what if the rising market is a bubble? Are we smart enough to ride it high and then bail out before it bursts? Research says we all think that we are, yet we rarely demonstrate th

Transformation or Bust, Part 2
by John Mauldin of Mauldin Economics, 8/11/14
Envisioning a clear path through the issues from where we are today is not easy, though China certainly has more options than the world had with subprime by the middle of 2008, when there was so much toxic waste on the balance sheets of banks all over the world and there was no turning back. As we have emphasized in the past and will do today, China does have options. But each of the options has costs associated with it, and those costs are going up every day. Who pays and when is the simple question that most readers want to have answered, but therein lies the conundrum.

Transformation or Bust
by John Mauldin of Mauldin Economics, 8/2/14
China continues to be front and center on my list of concerns, even moreso than the latest Federal Reserve press release or fluctuation in the Dow (although you should pay attention). I believe China is the single biggest risk to world economic equilibrium, even larger than Japan or Europe. This week my young associate Worth Wray provides us with a keenly insightful essay on what is currently happening in China. I will admit to not having written about China very much in the past five years, primarily because, prior to Worths coming to work with me I really had no secure understanding o

Time to Put a New Economic Tool in the Box
by John Mauldin of Mauldin Economics, 7/27/14
I dont think GDP as it is measured today is a Keynesian plot. GDP is a valuable measurement tool, if you understand what is being measured and all those asterisks with caveats that attend any such measure. But as we will see in this weeks letter, there are other ways to measure GDP that would suggest additional policy dials for spurring economic growth.

GDP: A Brief But Affectionate History
by John Mauldin of Mauldin Economics, 7/20/14
In this weeks letter we look at the construction of gross domestic product (GDP). As we will see, GDP is a relatively late-to-the-party statistic, thoroughly malleable in its construction and often quite contentious in its application. Yet the mainstream media regularly releases GDP numbers with the implicit assumption that they are in fact an accurate reflection of the general economy. We shall soon see that GDP is instead a fuzzy reflection of the economy, derived from a model that is continually readjusted in a well-intentioned effort to understand the scope of the economy.

Central Bank Smackdown
by John Mauldin of Mauldin Economics, 7/5/14
And so it is that on a beautiful July 4 weekend we will amuse ourselves by contemplating the serious smackdown that central bankers are visiting upon each other. If the ramifications of their antics were not so serious, they would actually be quite amusing. This weeks shorter than usual letter will explore the implications of the contretemps among the worlds central bankers and take a little dive into yesterdays generally positive employment report.

The New Normal of Healthcare Spending
by John Mauldin of Mauldin Economics, 6/30/14
A rather interesting shockwave came across the newsfeeds this week. I was actually doing a TV interview when the host announced that GDP was down 2.9% for the first quarter. There was not much else I could do but note that that was a really bad, ugly, terrible, not very good number.

Italy: When Hope Is a Strategy
by John Mauldin of Mauldin Economics, 6/23/14
I came back from Italy this week, and one of my guilty pleasures was being able to sit down and watch the last three episodes, including the season finale, of Game of Thrones. For those readers who are not enthralled with the fantasy epic from HBO or have not read the first five books (will he ever finish?), author George R.R. Martin has written one of the most complex fantasy series ever, about a world where everyone is occupied with who will sit on the Iron Throne.

The Age of Transformation
by John Mauldin of Mauldin Economics, 6/14/14
Today I offer some musings on what Ive come to think of as the Age of Transformation (which I have been thinking about a lot while in Tuscany). I believe there are multiple and rapidly accelerating changes happening simultaneously (if you can think of 10 years as simultaneously) that are going to transform our social structures, our investment portfolios, and our personal futures. We have had such transformations in the past. The rise of the nation state, the steam engine, electricity, the advent of the social safety net, the personal computer, the internet, and the collapse of communis

Can Central Planners Revive Chinas Economic Miracle?
by John Mauldin of Mauldin Economics, 6/8/14
We are going to try gamely to finish with China today, having left at least three or four letters worth of copy on the editing floor. There is just so much information and misinformation to cover. Im going to turn it over to Worth and then follow up with a few final thoughts of my own.

Looking at the Middle Kingdom with Fresh Eyes
by John Mauldin of Mauldin Economics, 5/31/14
China has the potential to become a real problem. It seemed to me that almost everyone who addressed the topic was either seriously alarmed at the extent of Chinas troubles or merely very worried. Perhaps it was the particular group of speakers we had, but no one was sanguine. If you recall, a few weeks back I introduced my young colleague and protg Worth Wray to you; and his inaugural Thoughts from the Frontline focused on China, a topic on which he is well-versed, having lived and studied there. Our conversations often center on China and emerging markets (and we tend

A Bubble in Complacency
by John Mauldin of Mauldin Economics, 5/25/14
The simple fact is that we are in what I call a Muddle Through Economy. Things arent terrible, but they are not great, either. Weve come through a devastating Great Recession caused by a crisis in the financial sector. It is quite typical for the effects of such a crisis to linger for a decade or more. So compared to where we were at the bottom of the Great Recession, the glass is half-full. But compared to the expectations we have for economic recovery and the resumption of vibrant growth, half-full seems like an exaggeration. And for many people, the glass is simply empty, whil

Are Valuations Really Too High?
by John Mauldin of Mauldin Economics, 5/11/14
I have done quite a number of media interviews and question-and-answer sessions with audiences in the past few months, and one question keeps coming up: "Are valuations too high?" In this weeks letter were going to try to look at the various answers (orthodox and not) one could come up with to answer that basic question, and then well look at market conditions in general.

A Yen for a Mortgage
by John Mauldin of Mauldin Economics, 5/3/14
For some time I have been saying that I was going to close the mortgage on my new apartment and then hedge it in yen. I promised to tell you the story, including what type of loan I got and how I am doing the hedge. This week I was finally able to pull the trigger. This topic will also let us re-examine why I think the Japanese yen is a screaming short. This is not a big think piece, but I think many of you will find it interesting. It outlines how I put my economic thinking into actual practice, and names names, if you will, of those who helped me do it.

The Cost of Code Red
by John Mauldin of Mauldin Economics, 4/27/14
There is reason to believe that there have been major policy mistakes made by central banks - and will be more of them - that will lead to dislocations in the markets - all types of markets. And its not just the usual anti-central bank curmudgeon types (among whose number I have been counted, quite justifiably) who are worried. Sources within the central bank community are worried, too, which should give thoughtful observers of the market cause for concern.

The Worst Ten-Letter Word
by John Mauldin of Mauldin Economics, 2/23/14
A new word is achieving ubiquity. The word has always been with us and at times has been a beacon to attract the friends of liberty and opportunity. But now I?m afraid it is beginning to be used as a justification for social and economic policies that will limit the expansion of both liberty and opportunity. The word? Inequality.

Bubbles, Bubbles Everywhere
by John Mauldin of Mauldin Economics, 11/2/13
The froth and foam on markets of all shapes and sizes all over the world. It is an exhilarating feeling, and the pundits who populate the media outlets are bubbling over with it. There is nothing like a rising market to help lift our mood. Unless of course, as Prof. Kindleberger famously cautioned, we are not participating in that rising market. Then we feel like losers. But what if the rising market is a bubble? Are we smart enough to ride and then step aside before it bursts? Research says we all think that we are, yet we rarely demonstrate the actual ability.

Nothing But Bad Choices
by John Mauldin of Mauldin Economics, 9/14/13
Crises in government funding dont simply arrive on the doorstep unannounced. Their progress toward the eventual Bang! moment is there for all the world to see. The root cause is almost always the same: debt. And whether that debt is actually borrowed or is merely promised to the populace, when the market becomes worried that the ability of the government to fund its promises is suspect, then the end is near. Last week we began a series on what I think is an impending crisis in the unfunded pension liabilities of state and local governments in the United States.
Results 651–668 of 668 found.