It is in a president’s interest to ensure that the economy and the stock market are strong. Yet the Trump administration has been doing just the opposite. The mood in the markets has been upbeat this week, largely because the president and his advisers softened their stances, rolling back some of their threats toward both…
When Congress voted to normalize trade relations with China at the beginning of this century, U.S. manufacturers braced for a stream of cheap goods to begin flowing into U.S. ports. Instead, they got a flood. Imports from China nearly tripled from 1999 to 2005, and American factories, with their higher wages and stricter safety standards,…
In the past, the one constituency President Trump has sometimes listened to has been our stock market. Well, it has spoken, falling 10.5 percent in one of the largest two-day stock market swoons in decades. In the 50 years I have been immersed in markets and economic policy, I have never before witnessed a signature…
The notion that the Federal Reserve will rush in to rescue investors in a crisis has comforted investors for decades. But in the big market downturn induced by President Trump’s tariffs, no Fed rescue is in sight. Jerome H. Powell, the Federal Reserve chair, made that clear on Friday. The tariffs are much “larger than…
Britons are bracing for a burst of higher inflation for much of this year as many household bills jump next month, a revival of the cost-of-living pressures that have squeezed household budgets in recent years. Next month, the average annual energy bill is set to rise 6.4 percent as the price cap resets. Water bills,…
The Federal Reserve is expected to keep its key rate steady on Wednesday, after a series of cuts that lowered rates by a full percentage point last year. That means consumers looking to borrow are likely to have to wait a bit longer for better deals on many loans, but savers will benefit from steadier…
The cloud behind the inflation silver lining Even upbeat economic news can offer little comfort to markets and the C-suite. Stocks look set to open lower as relief over Wednesday’s better-than-expected inflation report fades, and concerns grow that a trade war could sap consumer spending and corporate profits. That’s led more corporate chiefs to speak…
Inflation is expected to have stayed stubbornly high in February, an unwelcome sign for the Federal Reserve as it grapples with the prospect of a sharp slowdown in growth as a result of President Trump’s trade war. The latest reading of the Consumer Price Index, set for release on Wednesday, is forecast to have risen…
In 301 A.D., the Emperor Diocletian made a bold but ultimately unsuccessful bid to address the inflation that was rampaging across the eastern half of the divided Roman Empire. Prices of everything from purple thread and feathers to slaves and cattle were dictated by his Edict on Maximum Prices. Violators faced the death penalty. Diocletian…
President Trump on Saturday signed executive orders imposing sweeping tariffs on the country’s three largest trading partners, a move that risks unleashing a damaging trade war. Trade wars were a feature of Mr. Trump’s first term in the White House, too. But his latest tariffs on Canada, Mexico and China, which are set to take…