How negative real rates distort everything Normally a mortgage is a liability. And bonds are a low risk, low return asset. However when real interest rates are negative you can throw these conventional concepts out the window. The graph below shows the difference between a government bond yield and inflation (CPI.) The economy experiences negative real rates when… Read More »
The new normal The year is 2030. Self driving cars are delivering fast food right to people’s front doors. China surpasses the U.S. as the world’s largest economy. Everyone uses mobile wallets instead of credit cards. Increasing wealth inequality has created constant social unrest. But one thing hasn’t changed. Interest rates continue to remain at rock bottom. You… Read More »
Why inflation matters U.S. government bonds in 1990 were paying investors 8% a year. That sounds amazing! Especially for a low risk investment. 🙂 But not everyone was buying them. Why? Because investment returns don’t tell the whole story. The inflation rate that year was 5.4%. That means the real rate of return on those bonds was only… Read More »
Five years ago I acquired a variable rate mortgage from CIBC. It was the cheapest rate I could find at the time. I was quite pleased with the rate but that mortgage term expired a couple of months ago. So I shopped around to see if I can find another good deal. I expected my mortgage to become… Read More »
Stock Markets Reach Record Highs… Again Both the Dow Jones and the S&P 500 indexes have climbed to all time highs in late July. 🙂 But corporate earnings have been stagnant and economic growth remains weak. Restaurant sales have slowed. The U.S. economy only grew a disappointing 1.2% in the second quarter, well below expectations. 😕 So what’s… Read More »
New Purchase: Royal Bank of Canada Stock September has historically been a bad month for the stock market, and this year was no exception. This is why I didn’t invest aggressively last month. However now that it’s October, I decided to get back into buying more equities. 🙂 So after looking through my watch list of different companies,… Read More »