Tag Archives: Value

From Currency Resets to Limiting Infinite Growth, by Tom Luongo

Posted on May 19, 2022 | Leave a comment

The Malthusians’ and Thanos’ fundamental premise is terribly wrong, and is an ideological Trojan Horse for the globalists. From Tom Luongo at tomluongo.me:

A couple of weeks ago, RT ran a story purporting to explain the mystery behind the rise in exchange rate of the Russian ruble. It touched on a concept I’ve talked about vis a vis Russia for years: the disparity between nominal GDP which yields a number roughly the size of Canada and Purchasing Power Parity (PPP) GDP which puts Russia on par with Germany.

While everything quoted here I feel is worth considering seriously, that GDP disparity that is what is important.

… the West had defaulted on its obligations to Russia when it froze the assets of the country’s central bank. “This is the abolition (something like cancel culture) of the rules of international financial relations based on global total return swaps, redistribution of risk, guarantees of property rights and distribution of seigniorage.”

It was these rules that determined the old ruble exchange rate and the approaches to its establishment that we are accustomed to, the expert said, adding that those rules “no longer apply.”

Kopylov explained that the strengthening of the ruble is due to the fact that it is now based purely on exports and imports, and its value is determined by its purchasing power parity (PPP). The International Monetary Fund (IMF) estimated the Russian currency’s PPP at the end of 2021 at 29.127 rubles per one dollar. According to the Big Mac Index, that rate stood at 23.24 rubles to the dollar.

I have pointed out for years that all discussions of the Russian economy in terms of nominal GDP are bogus.  Nominal GDP is spending within the Russian economy converted through the RUB/USD exchange rate.

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Posted in Banking, Business, Currencies, Debt, Economics, Economy, Financial markets, Geopolitics, Governments, Politics, War

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Is Your Wealth Durable? By MN Gordon

Posted on March 11, 2022 | Leave a comment

If you’re banking on pieces of paper and computer entries for your kids college educations or your own retirement, you might want to reconsider. From MN Gordon at economicprism.com:

“Money is not the definition of wealth.”

– Unknown

America’s Oldest Family Farm

John Tuttle arrived in the New World from England in 1632.  He was not empty handed.

He had a land grant from King Charles II.  It was for a small, 20 acre plot of land located between the tidal waters of the Bellamy and Piscataqua rivers, in what became Dover, New Hampshire.  There, the Tuttle family farm expanded and prospered for over three centuries.

Along the way, the Tuttle’s withstood many tests.  Revolutionary and civil wars, the industrial revolution, economic depressions, financial panics, relentless competition, plagues, droughts, government encroachment, and countless other assaults to prosperity.

For a business to survive nearly 380 years in the same industry, with the same family owners, is a remarkable achievement.

Started in 1632, Tuttle Farm became America’s oldest continuously operated family farm, passed down across 11 generations of Tuttles from father to son.  What was their secret?

The Tuttle family, from its beginning in the New World, chose a productive path.  The second Tuttle, also John, born in 1646, owned a sawmill, had an ownership interest in several sailing vessels, and served for a time as judge of an early colonial court.  All this was in addition to his efforts running the family farm.

Yet the Tuttle’s success wasn’t without setbacks.  The third generation, also John, was the casualty of an Indian attack at a sawmill on the Upper Falls in 1712.

Still the family continued to prosper.  According to local legend, Tuttle maple syrup was purchased by Abraham Lincoln.

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Posted in Investing, Money, Morality, Philosophy

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Resolving creeping communism, by Alasdair Macleod

Posted on November 16, 2019 | 1 comment

Alasdair Macleod explains why socialism can’t work, particularly the socialization of money. From Macleod at goldmoney.com:

The thirtieth anniversary of the fall of the Iron Curtain coincides with a popular resurgence of communism and a drift into more socialism. A collective amnesia sees a return of the Soviet Union’s failed policies in a Marxist Labour party in Britain. Increasing socialism is expressed by US Democrats contending for the primaries.

This article explains the basic economic fallacies common to both. It clarifies why state ownership of the means of production does not resolve the problem of economic calculation in a socialist economy. It also explains the errors in socialistic condemnation of free markets.

And finally, it points out that very few of us realise we are more socialist than we think when we endorse government control of possibly our most important common commodity, which is our everyday money. But there is a simple solution: stop accommodating crony capitalists.

Introduction

This week saw the thirtieth anniversary of the breeching of the Berlin Wall. The elapse of time means most people younger than their mid-forties fail to understand what it was all about. Indeed, many folk older than that will have forgotten that the reason the Berlin Wall fell was because the communist states in eastern Europe and the old Soviet Union were no longer able to suppress their people. And the people were suppressed because suppression of personal freedom is central to communism, the creed that says people must make sacrifices for the common good. Besides the passage of time, the uncomfortable part which makes people want to forget its horrors is that communism is the both the basis and the final destination of modern socialism.

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Posted in Capitalism, Government, Money, Philosophy, Politics

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Valuations Not Only Mean-Revert; They Mean Invert, by John P. Hussman

Posted on September 29, 2015 | 1 comment

John Hussman stock market analytics are second to none. From Hussman, at hussmanfunds.com:

“… Almost everyone believed that speculation could be now resumed in earnest. A common feature of all these earlier troubles was that having happened they were over. The worst was reasonably recognized as such. The singular feature of the great crash of 1929 was that the worst continued to worsen. What looked one day like the end proved on the next day to have been only the beginning. Nothing could have been more ingeniously designed to maximize the suffering, and also to ensure that as few as possible escaped the common misfortune. The man with the smart money, who was safely out of the market when the first crash came, naturally went back in to pick up bargains. The bargains then suffered a ruinous fall.”

J.K. Galbraith, The Great Crash

“Is our profession really so lazy that we would advise people to risk their financial security based on tinker-toy models and pretty pictures that we don’t even have the rigor to test historically? Investors appear eager to ‘scoop up’ so-called ‘bargains’ on the belief that stocks are ‘cheap relative to bonds.’ All of this is predicated on the belief that profit margins will remain at record highs, that the Fed Model is correct, and that P/E ratios based on extremely elevated measures of earnings should be evaluated based on norms for much more restrained measures of earnings. Based on daily closing prices, the S&P 500 has not even experienced a 10% correction, yet the recent decline has been characterized as if investors are acting ‘like the world is about to end.’ This is not the pinnacle of human irrationality, but in fact, quite a shallow selloff from a historical standpoint. The fact that Wall Street is branding it otherwise is evidence that investors have completely forgotten how deep the market’s losses can periodically become.”

Hussman Weekly Market Comment, August 2007
Long-Term Evidence on the Fed Model and Forward Operating P/E Ratios

“Given the damage already wrought on the Nasdaq, there is a natural inclination to buy the dip. We believe that there is little merit in doing so. The current market climate is characterized by extremely unfavorable valuations, unfavorable trend uniformity, and hostile yield trends. This combination is what we define as a Crash Warning, and this climate has historically occurred in less than 4% of market history. That 4% of market history includes the 1929 crash and the 1987 crash, as well as a number of less memorable crashes and panics. We prefer to hedge until there is a rational prospect for market gains. When valuations are favorable, stocks are attractive from the standpoint of ‘investment’ – meaning that stock prices are attractive compared to the conservatively discounted value of cash flows which will be thrown off in the future. When trend uniformity is favorable, stocks are attractive from the standpoint of ‘speculation’ – meaning that regardless of valuation, investors are displaying an increased tolerance for risk which favors a further advance in prices.”

Hussman Investment Research & Insight, November 2000

If there is a single pertinent lesson from history at present, it is that once obscenely overvalued, overvalued, overbullish market conditions are followed by deterioration in market internals (what we used to call “trend uniformity”), the equity market becomes vulnerable to vertical air-pockets, panics and crashes that don’t limit themselves simply because short-term conditions appear “oversold.”

To continue reading: Valuations Not Only Mean-Revert; They Mean Invert

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Posted in Financial markets, Investing, Other Views

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