Peter's Blog

The Federal Reserve’s Independence Is an Illusion

The Fed’s supposed independence from the Treasury has always been more rhetoric than reality, and recent friction between Treasury Secretary Bessent and the Fed over currency intervention shows how that rhetoric bends whenever cooperation is convenient. The claimed separation lets both institutions share credit when policy succeeds and deflect blame onto each other when it […]

July Fed Meeting Minutes Reveal a Divided Central Bank

Even as inflation continues to run well above the central bank’s stated 2% target, the Fed’s latest decision was to hold interest rates steady. The meeting’s minutes were released on Wednesday, August 19th, offering a glimpse into the Fed governors’ perspectives on the economy and their role in it. Three regional Fed presidents, Beth Hammack, […]

Fed’s Barkin Describes a ‘Low-Hire, Low-Fire’ Economy That Doesn’t Feel Great

Richmond Fed President Tom Barkin told a business audience in Greenville, South Carolina, this week that the United States has averaged 2.5 percent real GDP growth since 2023 despite the pandemic, supply-chain shortages, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, conflicts in the Middle East, tariffs, and higher interest rates. He credited stout consumption, still nearly 70 percent […]

Headline PPI Holds Steady in July, but Core Price Pressures Persist

The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Thursday that its Producer Price Index (PPI) for final demand was unchanged in July, a reading that stands in contrast with the 4.7 percent increase recorded over the past 12 months. Consumer prices showed a similar pattern: the Consumer Price Index (CPI-U) rose 0.1 percent for the month but […]

Why the FIMA Repo Facility Can’t Save Japan (Or the U.S.)

Japan’s long experiment with near-zero rates and relentless deficit spending is hitting its limits, and the consequences are eventually going to hit U.S. markets. The yen’s slide toward levels not seen in decades forced Tokyo into repeated interventions, and for the first time since 1998, Washington joined in to save the U.S. and the world […]

Gold ETFs Return to Inflows as European and Asian Demand Rebounds

Global investors added about US$3 billion to gold-backed exchange-traded funds (ETFs) in July, ending a two-month run of net outflows. The inflows lifted total assets under management 1 percent higher, to US$530 billion, and coincided with a 2 percent rise in spot prices, enough to end gold’s four-month decline. European and Asian buyers accounted for […]

Household Survey Shows 1.8M Jobs Lost in 2026 so far

The analysis below covers the Employment picture released on the first Friday of every month. While most of the attention goes to the Headline Report, it can be helpful to look at the details, revisions, and other reports to get a better gauge of what is really going on. Current Trends The jobs report showed […]

US Government Borrows $800B in 3 months

Current Trends The US government has borrowed over $800B in the last three months. This is a gargantuan sum of money that annualizes to ~$3.2T. This is an astonishing amount of money given the economy is not technically in recession. If there is an even a minor bump in the economy, the government spending will […]

Fed’s Cook Says Inflation “Too High” as Gold Surges Past $4,250

Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook delivered a familiar warning in a speech in Anchorage on August 5th: price pressures remain stubborn. Citing a 3.7 percent annual rise in the Personal Consumption Expenditures (PCE) price index through June, Cook said flatly, “Inflation is too high.” Core PCE, which strips out food and energy, is running at […]

JOLTS Stalls Again as Gold Hovers Above $4,000

The latest Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS) showed little movement across the major measures. The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that job openings were “little changed” at 7.4 million in June 2026, a 4.4 percent openings rate that has barely budged for months. Hiring held at 5.3 million, while total separations stayed near […]