Financial Times (July 29)
“Inflation is falling for a number of reasons “beyond the Fed’s control,” like an easing of the worst impacts from “the pandemic and the war in Ukraine.” But the Fed’s rate hikes have effectively “reduced demand for credit.” The results can be seen in mortgage debt and car loans. “Overall, growth in non-revolving credit—the loans you take out just once, like a mortgage—is now just below zero.” There’s one snag on the revolving credit side, where credit growth is still “coming from credit cards.”
Tags: Car loans, Credit, Credit cards, Demand, Falling, Fed, Inflation, Mortgage debt, Non-revolving, Pandemic, Rate hikes, Revolving, Ukraine, War
The Economist (August 20)
“What are the most dysfunctional parts of the global financial system?” While here are many candidates, “if sheer size is your yardstick, nothing beats America’s housing market.” At $26 trillion, “it is the world’s largest asset class” and “the slab of mortgage debt lurking beneath it is the planet’s biggest concentration of financial risk.” This wasn’t fully sanitized in the wake of the financial crisis. “Vast, nationalised, unprofitable and undercapitalised, it remains a menace to the world’s biggest economy.”
Tags: Asset class, Dysfunctional, Financial risk, Global financial system, Housing market, Mortgage debt, Size, U.S.
