por admin » Lun Ago 19, 2019 7:32 am
Between a Rock and a Hard Place
Jerome Powell is caught between a slowing economy and an angry president. The Federal Reserve chairman faces scrutiny from markets and the White House over his stewardship of interest rates in an unsettled U.S. economy, Nick Timiraos writes.
Mr. Trump’s unyielding criticism of the Fed has led people inside the central bank to feel like they are fighting to both buoy the U.S. economy and preserve the Fed’s independence from political interference.
Mr. Powell is navigating the Fed toward more rate reductions, though conditions could change. The debate among his Fed colleagues is when and how much to move rates, as well as how to best frame the decision.
Investors and observers hope Mr. Powell's remarks Friday at the annual central bank conference in Jackson Hole, Wyo., will surface clues to the Fed’s next move.
Dialing for Dollars
A prolonged dollar rally is pressuring U.S. corporate earnings, hitting commodity prices and threatening to deepen a selloff in emerging markets. The ICE Dollar Index, which tracks the dollar against a basket of six major currencies, stands near its highest level in more than two years, Ira Iosebashvili reports. That's been a double-edged sword, both inside and outside the U.S.
U.S. exporters are less competitive abroad and U.S. multinationals are hit when they convert foreign revenues into U.S. currency.
Developing countries pay more to service their dollar-denominated debt, pressuring those that have borrowed heavily in U.S. currency.
Oil, copper and most other raw materials are denominated in dollars and become more expensive to foreign buyers.
U.S. companies that import goods from abroad benefit. It also, in theory, helps U.S. consumers buying foreign goods and American tourists spending dollars abroad.
The dollar’s strength also has been a boon to countries trying to boost growth because it makes their own currencies—and exports—cheaper.
Image
That 70s Show
The U.S.-China trade fight is the public face of a global slide toward protectionism. President Trump’s levies on products ranging from steel and solar panels to textiles have raised the average tariff applied on imports purchased by the U.S. to just over 4%, according to analyses by Deutsche Bank and UBS Group. The last time the average U.S. tariff levied on imports was anywhere near its current level was in the 1970s, Jason Douglas reports. That imposes costs: UBS calculates the blossoming trade conflict has kept the U.S. economy around 0.75% smaller than it would have been had tariffs stayed where they were.
Image
New Kids on the Block
Summer unemployment among young Americans is the lowest it has been since the 1960s. The share of those working or seeking work also ticked upward in July to the highest level in a decade, though the figure remains historically low. Why the low participation rate? Economists say more students are taking summer courses or building their resumes with unpaid internships, underscoring a shift to a knowledge-based economy. Further, wages from summer jobs are unlikely to make a dent in tuition costs, deterring some would-be summer workers, Sarah Chaney reports.
Image
I Call This One...Blue Steel
Australia's BlueScope Steel said it will expand its U.S. business, joining American rivals that have outlined plans to add capacity. Slowing global growth is deepening confidence among steel executives that the U.S. and other countries will resort to infrastructure spending to give their economies some much-needed juice, Rhiannon Hoyle reports.
CEOs Ditch Milton Friedman
The Business Roundtable is changing its statement of “the purpose of a corporation.” No longer should decisions be based solely on whether they will yield higher profits for shareholders. Rather, corporate leaders should take into account “all stakeholders”—that is, employees, customers and society writ large. It is a major philosophical shift for the association, which counts the chief executives of dozens of the biggest U.S. companies as its members. Its old statement of purpose espoused economist Milton Friedman’s decades-old theory that companies’ only obligation is to maximize value for shareholders.