Going Negative
Posted on October 25th, 2010 by mark in Market Observations
No, the title doesn’t suggest politics – although it easily could. Something far scarier is afoot. Today, the federal government conned investors into buying bonds which pay negative 0.55%. There is, of course, more to the story, as these were inflation-protected securities (TIPS). Investors were hungry today for the bonds, pushing the prices up – [...]
Ebb and Flow
Posted on February 19th, 2010 by mark in Market Observations
In a surprise move today, the Federal Reserve raised the somewhat low-profile discount rate from 0.50% to 0.75%. Supposedly, they are backing away from “emergency” operations and things are slowly getting back to “normal”. In the great scheme of things, this doesn’t sound like much, but rate cycles are long term events and while we [...]