“Albert Edwards: Negative Rates, 15% Budget Deficits And Helicopter Money”

Vor zwei Wochen habe ich die Modern Monetary Theory besprochen: → Die Theorie für die Helikopter: „Geld ist zum Schöpfen da“ – na dann los!

Auch andere greifen die Idee auf und beschäftigen sich damit, weshalb genau dieses Thema heute aufkommt: mit Blick auf hohe Schulden, tiefe Zinsen und den Ausblick auf nachhaltig tiefes Wachstum. Irgendwie muss man doch einen Ausweg finden?

Albert Edwards schreibt in seinem neuesten Kommentar:

• “(…) as central banks thrash around for new tools, I have long thought the next recession would trigger the adoption of helicopter money and deeply negative Fed Funds. Clients have been sceptical of the latter because of the negative impact on bank margins, but now I am more convinced than ever that we will see negative Fed Funds.” – bto: Was passt zu den Überlegungen, Bargeld zu besteuern. Ich denke auch, dass wir noch gar nicht ermessen können, was da auf uns zurollt.
• “Edwards also focuses on the recent resurgence of interest in Modern-Money Theory, i.e., MMT, or government-mandated helicopter money, which is predictably a ‘theory’ espoused by socialists everywhere most notably Bernie Sanders and his economic advisors (…).” – bto: Es geht darum, die Budgetrestriktion auszuhebeln. Dazu zeigt dann Zero Hedge, wie die Suche nach dem Begriff wieder zugenommen hat:

Quelle: Zero Hedge

• “(…) many of the more radical Democrats in the US seem to be adopting the idea and since I expect the US budget deficit to soar to 15% of GDP in the next recession, the ideas of MMT will surely become even more popular. (…) the Fed and other central banks will be desperate enough to adopt outright monetisation (aka helicopter money, that is to say the direct central bank financing of public sector deficits) in the next recession. And as that will coincide with public sector deficits in the mid teens, we will be conducting a live MMT experiment. Welcome to a brave new world!” – bto: Das wirft die Frage auf, was denn die Folgen sein werden? Wenn er mit Negativzinsen arbeitet, kann das nur bedeuten, dass er nicht mit Inflation rechnet.
• “When QE was introduced the central bankers vehemently denied that QE was monetisation as the latter sounded too scary. Their argument was QE is different from outright monetisation because they (the central banks) were absolutely going to unwind QE as soon as practical [aka Quantitative Tightening or QT – remember how they told us it was going to be so easy with minimal consequences!]. And as economic agents knew QE would be reversed and did not regard it permanent, QE could not be equated to monetisation. My own view has always been that until QE is actually fully reversed, it is to all intents and purposes the equivalent of outright monetisation, and so the central banks are merely splitting hairs.” – bto: Das gilt vor allem in der Eurozone und alle wissen es. Nur die dummen Deutschen dürfen es nicht wissen, aber die Regierung natürlich. Aber sie genießt und schweigt.
• “(…) does anyone really think these bloated central bank balance sheets will ever be reduced before the next recession brings yet another tidal wave of QE?” The answer: of course not, especially if it only took a 20% drop in stocks for the Fed to immediately reverse its “autopilot” course.” – bto: So ist es wohl.
• “(…) all-knowing” central bankers will pull any and every policy lever they have to hand and that in my view includes the Fed pursuing deeply negative interest rates. (…) I have long said that in the next recession the main toxic asset to avoid will be US corporate bonds – most especially Investment Grade. In the next recession, banks will inevitably lose money if commercial and residential property prices decline and corporate and consumer loans default – although we have been reassured that banks are better capitalised than before and that they have been vigorously stress-tested.” – bto: Dennoch gibt es die Verluste und jemand muss sie tragen (können).
• “(…) due to the Volker Rule and other macro-prudent regulations, banks do not sit on mountains of corporate and mortgage paper as they did in 2007. It is pension funds, insurance companies –and via ETFs, mom and pop – who bought the avalanche of US corporate bonds issued since the last GFC. So the good news, according to the grumpy SocGen permabear, is that banks are unlikely to be a systemic risk as the next crisis drives a rapid unravelling of the global economy, like they were in 2008.” – bto: Na, dann ist ja alles gut!
• “That is why he is confident that central bankers will not care if bank profits are squeezed as interest rates are pushed deep into negative territory – including the sort of adverse market reaction towards the banking sector we saw when Japan cut interest rates from +0.1% to -0.1% in early 2016 (Japanese banks fell around 25% relative to the market as did the eurozone banks as the ECB pushed interest rates to minus 0.4%, see charts below).” – bto: Und die Märkte nehmen das zumindest für die europäischen Banken vorweg.

• “However, it is not just the eurozone that risks falling into outright deflation in the next recession: according to Edwards, the US is also vulnerable, and while core CPI and core PCE have remained relatively healthy in recent months, and roughly at the Fed’s 2% target, this has been mostly a function of strong rents and Owner Equivalent Rent, i.e. housing prices, which dominate the core CPI calculation.” – bto: Die Inflationsmessung ist so oder so problematisch.
• “However, the risk is that US rent inflation ‘tends to broadly follow the fortunes of the housing market overall and there is no doubt that the US housing market has begun to unravel quickly over the past six months. New home prices are now actually falling yoy (even with a heavy 9-month moving average, see right-hand chart below). The last two occasions this happened were Nov 1990 and Dec 2007 when the US economy had entered recession! Rent inflation slumped shortly afterwards. In the next recession, the reality of outright deflation will dominate investors’ fears.” – bto: Zu Recht, denn man kann gegen Schulden-Deflation wenig ausrichten.

Quelle: SocGen, Zero Hedge

• “Meanwhile, in addition to inflation, central banks will be keeping a close eye on the dollar. The reason for that, according to Edwards, is that one key policy lesson from Japan in the 1990s (and the GFC of 2008) when the economy slipped towards outright deflation is that a strong currency must be avoided at all costs as it exacerbated the deflation impulse still further.” – bto: Das spricht für einen relativ stärkeren Euro, trotz der sich daraus ergebenden Probleme für die Eurozone. Die EZB wird immer langsamer reagieren als die Fed.
• “The Fed will be forced to participate as avoiding deflation will be the number 1 priority – not the profitability of the banking sector. Investors should contemplate a brave new world of negative Fed Funds, negative US 10y and 30y bond yields, 15% budget deficits and helicopter money.” – bto: So oder so wird die nächste – letzte? – Runde des Schuldenkarussells spannend.

→ zerohedge.com: “Albert Edwards: Investors Should Brace For A World Of Negative Rates, 15% Budget Deficits And Helicopter Money”, 7. Februar 2019