Get the Morning Brief sent directly to your inbox every Monday to Friday by 6:30 a.m. ET. Why Wall Street’s number crunchers have more conviction in their forecasts “In economic parlance, the current environment is one of pervasive ‘Knightian uncertainty’ — that is, an unknown for which we cannot even quantify the odds of various outcomes.” That’s what JPMorgan eco... read more

The number of Americans who filed for unemployment benefits for the first time came in above 1 million for a second consecutive week as the economy tries to recover from the coronavirus pandemic, the Labor Department said Thursday. Initial U.S. jobless claims totaled just over 1 million for the week ending Aug. 22. Economists polled by Dow Jones expected initial jobless claims, down from 1.1... read more

History will remember Paul Volcker and Jerome Powell as standing on the opposite ends of the inflation canyon, with the former taking desperate actions to try to tamp it down and the latter expected this week to announce an unprecedented effort to crank it back up. Volcker, the Federal Reserve chairman from 1979-87, ushered through a series of inflation-busting interest rate hikes that dragg... read more

After more than a decade of below-average inflation rates in the U.S., there’s a basic question that begs answering: Is inflation on the way? This same question was asked quite a bit coming out of the Great Recession (2008-09), and there was much fear that higher inflation would ravage the U.S. economy. That fear wasn’t misguided, as the historical relationship between inflation rates and m... read more

Gold rose on Monday, consolidating near the $1,950 mark after plunging 4.5% last week, buoyed by a weaker dollar as investors await the fine print on the U.S. Federal Reserve’s strategy to stem the economic toll of the coronavirus. Spot gold rose 0.3% to $1,950.16 an ounce and U.S. gold futures gained 0.5% to $1,959.10. Gold last week registered its biggest decline since March as invest... read more

(Bloomberg) -- The Federal Reserve could allow inflation to accelerate above its 2% goal if has underperformed it in the past, said Dallas Fed President Robert Kaplan. “I would be willing to see inflation run moderately above 2% in the aftermath of periods where we’ve been running persistently below,” Kaplan said Friday in a virtual event with the Dallas Friday Group, a business organi... read more

Do you sense an approaching endgame? Like there’s another heavy shoe to drop? Perhaps an entire closet’s worth? Certainly there’s entirely too much confusion surrounding SARS-CoV-2 and how to deal with it. Should people wear masks? Will schools re-open? Should they? Why isn’t Covid-19 being treated consistently across medical centers? Are there things we could and shou... read more

Gold futures on Thursday looked likely to extend a record rally to a fifth straight day, with a muted U.S. dollar and lackluster moves in equities supporting bullion’s ascent to near $2,100. “Gold price continues to skyrocket as demand for the precious metal surges,” wrote Carlo Alberto De Casa, chief analyst at ActivTrades, in a daily note. Appetite for precious metals, including s... read more

In the next few months, the Federal Reserve will be solidifying a policy outline that would commit it to low rates for years as it pursues an agenda of higher inflation and a return to the full employment picture that vanished as the coronavirus pandemic hit. Recent statements from Fed officials and analysis from market veterans and economists point to a move to “average inflation” targe... read more

Gold prices have hit all-time highs, but industry heavyweights Jim Rickards, best-selling author, and Peter Schiff, CEO of Euro Pacific Capital, both think that the rally is far from over. Rickards’ analysis points the gold price to $15,000 by 2025. “I would put [gold at $15,000 an ounce before 2025,” Rickards told Kitco News. “If you just take the average of the prior bull mark... read more