It’s easy to get caught up in the day-to-day gyrations of the market, pronouncements of certain government or central bank officials, and the most recent data dump. So, it’s important to keep your eye on the ball. In this episode of the Friday Gold Wrap podcast, host Mike Maharrey breaks down the latest inflation data and the Fed meeting with his eye firmly focused on that ball.
As expected, the Federal Reserve raised interest rates by 50 basis points at the December Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) meeting. That pushed the federal funds rate to 4.5%. The last time rates were this high was in 2007. That’s bad news for an economy addicted to easy money.
While the pace of rate hikes slowed, the messaging coming out of the Fed was substantially the same as the November meeting.
President Joe Biden said Americans are becoming more optimistic about the economy. He said that’s part of the “broad story about the economy we’re building that works for everyone.” Peter Schiff has a different take on the economy. He recently appeared on The Megyn Kelly Show to talk about it.
Stocks have struggled in recent days due to some better-than-expected economic data and more hawkish talk from Fed officials. This has revived fears that the Federal Reserve could make a mistake and raise rates too high and keep them there too long, sparking a recession. In his podcast, Peter Schiff said the markets are worried about the wrong mistake.
According to the Democrats and many mainstream pundits, the US economy is “resilient.” As Laura Ingraham put it, “it’s all peaches and cream according to Joe and his team.”
But what’s the truth?
Peter Schiff painted a less rosy picture during his appearance on The Ingraham Angle, saying the coming currency crisis is going to fuel the inflationary fire.
The powers that be keep telling you that the economy is fine and inflation has likely peaked. But you’re not buying the story.
Consumer confidence fell for the second straight month in November as worries about inflation and the trajectory of the economy persist.
In another sign of a struggling economy, small businesses are having an increasingly hard time paying rent.
According to Alignable’s November Rent Poll, 41% of US small businesses reported they couldn’t pay their rent in full and on time in November. That was a 4 percentage-point increase from the previous month.
A lot of mainstream pundits concede that the US economy is heading for a recession as the Federal Reserve continues to crank up interest rates in its inflation fight. But as Peter Schiff explained in a recent podcast, there is plenty of data that indicates the economy is already in a recession.
The third quarter GDP data came out this week and it looks like the recession is over. (If there ever was one.) But in this episode of the Friday Gold Wrap podcast, host Mike Maharrey digs into the data and says, “Not so fast!” He also talks about a mainstream economist who sounds a lot like Peter Schiff and a big problem brewing with diesel fuel.
People keep saying the economy is fine. We’re not in a recession. There’s nothing to see here.
Meanwhile, business activity contracted for the fourth straight month in October.
