• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar

Chris Leithner

  • About Chris
  • Archive
  • Links
  • Books – Australia
  • Books – Canada
  • Books – USA
  • Show Search
Hide Search

Leithner Letter Nos. 209-212

Chris · March 26, 2017 ·

26 March 2017 – 26 June 2017

Let the directors of the [Second Bank of the United States] pursue their business on principles of Christian benevolence, and all will be well. Let them wind up the business of the Bank, without attempting to break down the government, … and it will die with the blessings of thousands; otherwise, it will have the curses of millions. I have read the Scriptures, gentlemen, and I find that when Moses ascended the mountain, the children of Israel rebelled, and made a golden calf and worshipped it, and it brought a curse upon them. This Bank will be a greater curse. I have no hostility to the Bank; I am willing it should expire in peace; but if it does persist in its war with the government, I have a measure in contemplation which will destroy it at once, and which I am resolved to apply, be the consequences to individuals what they may. The Bank has in circulation ten millions of cheques, which I have no doubt are illegal, and which I will direct the state banks to refuse in payment of the public revenue. These cheques must then be returned upon the bank … This measure I will apply, unless the Bank desists from its course.

U.S. President Andrew Jackson
11 February 1833

The financial and economic crisis [of 2008-2009] has increased further the dependency of the world’s financial system on the U.S. dollar. As early as December 2008, the Fed provided so called “liquidity swap agreements.” Under the latter the Fed is prepared to lend newly-created U.S. dollars to other central banks around the globe. … Meanwhile, all major central banks around the world … have joined the liquidity swap agreement club. They also have agreed to provide their own currencies to all other central banks — in actually unlimited amounts if needed.

… Mr. Trump doesn’t seem to be an “internationalist,” seeking to build a new world order by political and military means. If that is so, he will sooner or later have to come to grips with the Fed’s policies — most notably with its liquidity swap agreements. … The Fed’s policy has made the world’s financial system addicted to ever greater amounts of U.S. dollars … From this the U.S. banks benefit greatly, while average Americans bear the brunt: they pay the price in terms of, for instance, boom and bust and an erosion of the purchasing power of the U.S. dollar.

Thorstein Polleit
What Will Trump Do About the Central-Bank Cartel?
(Ludwig von Mises Institute, 12 February 2017)
(see also 
A New Jacksonian Era? Washington’s Blog, 13 February 2017)

Economic Policy Uncertainty and Financial Market
Volatility: Yet Another Example of Complacency
in the Face of Risk?

In Leithner Letter 200-204 (26 July – 26 October 2016) I reasoned to the conclusion that stock markets in the U.S. – and, by implication, Australia – have become greatly and perhaps dangerously overvalued. Here I analyse two additional developments: first, around the world economic policy has become highly unsettled; second, and in sharp contrast, volatility in financial markets, and the fear that underpins it, seems implausibly low. Hence a key question – indeed, perhaps the key question for investors worthy of the name: can this combination of uncertainty, complacency and overvaluation persist indefinitely?

To read the full Newsletter (PDF), click here.

Filed Under: Uncategorized

Primary Sidebar

Subscribe to the Leithner Letter

* indicates required

About this website

About this website

This site hosts newsletters, books, etc., written initially for shareholders of Leithner & Company Pty Ltd and subsequently for anybody who wants to read them. … [Read More] about About this website

Recent Posts

  • Will 2023 be beautiful or ugly? January 23, 2023
  • Why fossil fuels are ethical and their opponents aren’t December 19, 2022
  • The factual case for fossil fuels December 12, 2022
  • How we’ve prepared for the next bust November 28, 2022
  • How Low Could Stocks Go in 2023? November 14, 2022

Archives

  • January 2023
  • December 2022
  • November 2022
  • October 2022
  • September 2022
  • August 2022
  • July 2022
  • June 2022
  • May 2022
  • April 2022
  • March 2022
  • February 2022
  • January 2022
  • December 2021
  • November 2021
  • October 2021
  • September 2021
  • July 2021
  • June 2021
  • May 2021
  • April 2021
  • March 2021
  • February 2021
  • January 2021
  • December 2020
  • November 2020
  • October 2020
  • September 2020
  • June 2020
  • March 2020
  • November 2019
  • July 2019
  • March 2019
  • November 2018
  • August 2018
  • April 2018
  • September 2017
  • July 2017
  • March 2017
  • November 2016
  • July 2016
  • March 2016
  • November 2015
  • July 2015
  • March 2015
  • October 2014
  • June 2014
  • February 2014
  • October 2013
  • July 2013
  • February 2013
  • November 2012
  • July 2012
  • April 2012
  • December 2011
  • August 2011
  • April 2011
  • November 2010
  • July 2010
  • April 2010
  • December 2009
  • September 2009
  • June 2009
  • March 2009
  • December 2008

Copyright © 2023 · Chris Leithner