Gab@StFerdinandIII - https://unstabbinated.substack.com/
Plenty of cults exist - every cult has its 'religious dogma', its idols, its 'prophets', its 'science', its 'proof' and its intolerant liturgy of demands. Cults everywhere: Corona, 'The Science' or Scientism, Islam, the State, the cult of Gender Fascism, Marxism, Darwin and Evolution, Globaloneywarming, Changing Climate, Abortion...
Tempus Fugit Memento Mori - Time Flies Remember Death
The cult of easy money, and central bankers as gods. An endless river of printed money, negative real interest rates, government guarantees to banks regarding mortgage lending; juxtaposed against an employment rate of 60% and falling; declining real incomes [heading to $50K p.a]; and geopolitical tensions that the media rarely report on. Stocks and housing prices apparently can only go up, never down.
Stock market rise is mapped 1:1 to the Fed Reserve's balance sheet:
Another nascent bubble lies in housing. Housing prices bear no relationship to income whatsoever. Historically the ratio of house price to income was around 3x. Today in most urban centres, for a detached house, it is between 8-12 x. The only reason 'average' home prices are in the 6-7x income range, is due to stacks of cheap condos being built, which are not houses, but counted as such in the inventory of home products. They drag down the average price.
Roubini: “Signs that home prices are entering bubble territory in these economies include fast-rising home prices, high and rising price-to-income ratios, and high levels of mortgage debt as a share of household debt. In most advanced economies, bubbles are being inflated by very low short- and long-term interest rates. Given anemic GDP growth, high unemployment, and low inflation, the wall of liquidity generated by conventional and unconventional monetary easing is driving up asset prices, starting with home prices.”
The key is high prices to income. When that ratio deviates significantly from the historical mean, you know that a correction will happen. When? No one knows, but prices go down much faster than they go up.