QUESTION: Hi Martin, How is the dollar supposed to continue to rise when Trump and all of his cabinet members want a weaker dollar? They constantly blame others with currency manipulation, all the while they are in fact manipulating the dollar lower with their comments. Hello pot, meet kettle!!! The last 2 Fridays the dollar has sold off drastically wiping out the entire week gains even on positive US market news. When will the dollar index start to breakout again?

ANSWER: Nobody can manipulate the currency market forcing it to change trend. Trump will fail because he cannot manipulate the dollar down when the FX market’s $5.3 trillion per day in trading volume dwarfs the equities and futures markets. Yes, the Treasury has less than $150 billion in its bad to try to manipulate the currency. Good luck. Trump is wrong about China manipulating its currency. You see China going after Bitcoin trying desperately to prevent capital flight. There is nothing Trump can do to prevent the rise in the dollar when you have Europe on life-support as is the case in Japan, and China keeps trying to stop its citizens from putting money offshore.

Even banning all the government together cannot reverse the global capital flows. If the economics of Europe are in crisis and election after election seeks to exit the EU, there is far more at stake than just politics. We are looking at a crisis in European banking as their reserves are made of of Euro members. The ECB hold 40% of member states bonds. A breakup of the Eurozone holds far more chaos than anything you have read about Europe – AND THAT IS AN UNDERSTATEMENT.

We are preparing an institutional risk report on this subject, and it is massively under-reported and not even comprehended. Trump will fail because he and his team lack the scope of international understanding. If we look only at trade, the share of manufactures in world merchandise trade fluctuated in the range of 55-60% between 1973 and 1985, then increased sharply, reaching 75% by 1995. One might expect total recorded world trade, exports plus imports, over all countries to equal financial flows payments plus receipts. But in fact, during 1996–2001, the former was $17.3 trillion, more than three times the latter, at $5.0 trillion. The problem is our accounting system for trade. To reduce the trade surplus Japan had with the USA during the 1990s, we instructed our clients to buy gold on the COMEX and take delivery. The golds was thus exported and resold again into London. The trade surplus was reduced for there is no distinction between a manufactured product and raw commodities.

Likewise, most financial capital flows are not recorded at all. Financial transactions between international financial institutions are cleared by netting daily offsetting transactions. Hence, U.S. banks have claims on Japanese banks for $10 billion and Japanese banks have claims on U.S. banks for $12 billion. Therefore, the net flow recorded in the transactions will be cleared through their central banks with only $2 million from the United States to Japan. Then if the purchase of the good in the USA by Japan are financed, the goods may travel but no money moves between the countries. Since the collapse of Bretton Woods, the introduction of the floating exchange rate system has rendered the global capital flows gibberish from a formal accounting standard since the value of the dollar rises and falls making comparisons impossible using a system that was designed with a fixed exchange rate system in mind. Since the 1970s, this has resulted in a sustained and unexplained balance-of-payments discrepancies in both trade and financial flows.The unrecorded capital flows in netting out positions distorts the real picture. We have to obtain raw data to overcome these problems and then run it through the filter of floating exchange rates to come up with any hope of understanding capital flows

Another major discovery of oil has been made in Alaska of 1.2 billion barrels. It is the largest find of conventional oil for 30 years on US territory. The discovery was made by the Spanish oil company Repsol on Thursday with its US partner Armstrong Energy. According to a report from the company, the production potential is up to 120,000 barrels of oil per day, and production is scheduled to start in four years. This will probably increase the US standing to overtake Nigeria entering the list of top ten.

The stock market, gold, silver, and oil all rallied when the Federal Reserve delivered the widely expected increase in its benchmark interest rate on Wednesday, the Ides of March. It said that the domestic economy remained on a path of slow and steady growth. In a statement the Fed said that the United States economy continued to move along expanding at a “moderate pace.” The consumers were spending with businesses and employers were still hiring.

The Fed also noted a recent increase in inflation after a long period of sideways movement. Prices are now rising at roughly the 2% on an annual pace that the Fed regards as optimal, however, picking up the rug reveals that healthcare costs are acting more like oil did during the 1970s. This raises concern that we may be entering really stagflation and not true inflation driven by expanding demand. The Fed now said its focus would be stabilizing inflation. They really need to look closely at the driving forces. As more and more states move into crisis like California, we will see rising taxation to cover the crisis in pensions. This will feed stagflation – and prevent rising inflation from demand.

The Fed’s forecasts have moved in the direction of tightening, and despite what they say publicly, the most serious stimulus is rising stock prices. There was one vote against the rate hike, Neel Kashkari, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis, who said that the Fed’s statement did not provide a reason for Mr. Kashkari’s vote. However, this is because the real reason behind the rate hike has been the rise in the stock market.

The computer forecast back in 2011 showed that the trend would change in 2015. Indeed, the first rate hike came that December. The next target was 2017 and we have seen the rates continue to rise. The next key target will be 2019.

Here is the current Yearly Array. We still see 2019 as a major target objective. Note the Directional Changes either side and higher volatility should begin to appear starting next year.

Honing in with the quarterly level, it appears we should be looking at the 1st quarter 2018 as the main target. Note the Directional Change coming the 3rd quarter here in 2017.

We see the resistance standing at 2.25%. So we have a full 1% above the current level to rise before one must consider the crisis in interest rates begins. Keep in mind that low interest rates helps government but kills pensions. Higher rates will help ease the Pension Crisis but create a budget crisis.

QUESTION: Hello Martin