A BBB world

According to Austrian Joseph Salerno (who recently did a ‘funny number‘) that´s the world of “Bernanke the Bubble Blower”:

While Keynesians continue to sing that lame old song about insufficient aggregate demand stimulus and the horrors of austerity and “market” monetarists prattle on about deficient growth in nominal GDP, the signs of an incipient asset bubble become more evident every day. In fact it would not be overstating the case to say that the Fed is deliberately aiming at recreating an asset bubble as a means of rekindling the historically unprecedented consumption booms of the latter half of the 1990s and the first part of last decade. These consumption manias were driven by the “wealth” or “net worth” effect, pithily described in the metaphor “using one’s home as an ATM machine.” As the following graphs show, Fed monetary policy is succeeding in pumping up household net worth, which consists mainly of financial assets plus real estate owned by households (and nonprofit organizations) minus household debt.

One thought on “A BBB world

  1. Picture a sadist in jackboots, jodhpurs and who has involuntary arm spasms when he hears martial music. Then picture that man as a central banker of the Austrian school. Add on a few dueling scars and mustache.

    Crickey! Prosperity results in higher asset values. So, to avoid bubbles, we just have to cancel out prosperity. Is this man insane?

    Yes, higher rentals mean property is worth more, and higher corporate profits means equities are worth more.

    We should stop this?

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