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People continually reference the lack of inflation (as traditionally measured by the CPI price basket) as a reason to not be concerned with the huge increase in

People continually reference the lack of inflation (as traditionally measured by the CPI price basket) as a reason to not be concerned with the huge increase in the money supply we've experienced. I think we are experiencing extreme inflation, just not in CPI goods, but rather capital assets. Stocks, bonds, real-estate, all are completely disconnected from any reality right now... traditional valuation is irrelevant and we are now trading purely on sentiment, ala meme-stonks. Just look at the IPO landscape, and the ridiculous market caps of companies who not only have never had positive net income, but in fact have an increasing loss every year! They can continue doing this because the capital markets basically throw free money at them, it's easy to raise debt at low rates and issue additional shares if needed. As they say "don't fight the fed", and timing the market is impossible, but I can't even begin to fathom the blood-bath that will ensue if rates were increased to a reasonable level.

boublepop 6y ago
True. Feels like the concept of looking for inflation by watching the price of milk and bread makes no sense when the supply/demand curve is hiding the fact that we have an extreme overproduction of both ready to go, but kept from the market in order to avoid harming the market. On the other hand everyone is putting every last excess dollar they have into the stock market because banks can’t offer interest, so prices are exploding without any grip on reality.
jopsen 6y ago
> blood-bath that will ensue if rates were increased to a reasonable level. Any reason to think that'll happen? Won't assets inflation just stay and maybe level off.. my point is: nobody is going to pull money out of stocks to buy bread and milk. Isn't stonks the best thing to hold, if we have inflation.
- solaxun 6y ago
  It's a complicated relationship, but yes stocks generally perform well in inflationary environments, certainly better than bonds which unequivocally get crushed. However, often what happens along with rate increases is tighter lending standards, increased borrowing costs, less ability to refinance at attractive rates, etc. It's also more difficult to raise equity when investors have reasonable alternatives in other asset classes. Suddenly investors start caring about tired and old things like "valuation" again, and "price to eyeballs" or "tweets per minute" matter less. For companies that have been riding the wave of free money in perpetuity, that's a bitter pill to swallow - when it's time to refinance they aren't prepared to pay the new bill. More dangerously, they simply may not be able to refinance at all if credit markets dry up (2008), and that is when it gets really ugly. Stock prices are as high as they are right now because there are no reasonable alternatives. It's the "least bad" option.
  - jopsen 6y ago
    So as long as the fed can increase money supply, the dance continues -- and holding stonks is fine. Once the dance stops, which might be a while... Then you'll want to be holding assets of actual value. What happens to inflation when money supply dries out?
  - stevofolife 6y ago
    I thought interest rates and rate of inflation have an inverse relationship.
    - solaxun 6y ago
      nominal interest = real interest + inflation
bko 6y ago
Does anyone else feel like inflation is under-reported on a personal level? After barber shops opened I was surprised my barber increased his prices from $25 -> $40. I poked my head in a few other barber shops and they've had similar price increases. I think restaurants also increased their prices. I remember restaurants where the prices were $14-17 for most dishes now charge ~$18-22 Of course this is purely anecdotal.
- enjeyw 6y ago
  Not sure if it was a typo, but I think you’re looking for the word “anecdotal” not “antidotal” (coming from someone who messes these kinda things up all the time)
  - bko 6y ago
    Yup, corrected. Thanks!
- pfranz 6y ago
  Personally, I haven't noticed in the price of goods. I wouldn't be surprised if services increased their price since we're still in the middle of a pandemic. I imagine the flow of customers are down (I love restaurants but don't have any immediate interest in going to that or a barber shop) and the people going are more motivated than the average customer hence willing to pay more. I also think a price increase might be done because of sympathies knowing those kinds of businesses are struggling.
- dragonwriter 6y ago
  Barber shops and restaurants are a fairly small part of what people spend money on (especially with COVID) and have seen a big drop in unit sales across which to spread fixed costs. So, inflation there is higher than general inflation. Inflation across different sectors varies a lot; the overall level is a aggregate but not one around which the sector-specific numbers cluster tightly. https://www.bls.gov/news.release/archives/cpi_02102021.htm https://www.bls.gov/news.release/archives/cpi_02102021.htm
confidantlake 6y ago
Also housing, healthcare, and college tuition.
dragonwriter 6y ago
> I think we are experiencing extreme inflation, just not in CPI goods, but rather capital assets Assets don't provide direct utility, asset price inflation isn't inflation as that term is understood without modification, the same reason that producer price inflation and other inflation outside of consumer goods and services is. It's definitely a thing that occurs, but it doesn't have the same effects and trying to conflate them is just equivocation. > Just look at the IPO landscape, The cycles in the IPO landscape and stock market trends for fairly early-stage but post-IPO firms probably relates more to waves of enthusiasm about promising new immature sectors (and the erosion of those enthusiasms) than monetary policy; the dotcom boom had all the same things you say about the current time, despite much tighter monetary policy with Fed funds rates in the 5% range rather than hovering around 0%.
bcrl 6y ago
In my family, we see it in our food bills. Due to COVID, most other expenses are down, as we drive less, and don't go out to our normal activities (everything from coffee, to restaurants, movies, even just stopping in a corner store on the drive home). However, our food bills are almost double what they were a few years ago. The worst part is that packages of standard food items keep getting smaller which hides this effect in some of the inflation indices - just look at the weight of a package of cookies, or the cost of a pound of beef. But, hey, at least the increase in housing prices is hidden by ridiculously low interest rates.
- dominotw 6y ago
  > we see it in our food bills I saw this too but ppl point me to govt figures for inflation and its never matches what i experience personally.
  - londons_explore 6y ago
    My government is pretty expert at changing the method to calculate official inflation figures to make them look lower. Sometimes we include housing, sometimes not. Sometimes we include loan interest, sometimes not... Etc. They are also expert at issuing provisional figures that are usually revised upwards retrospectively many years later.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]

boublepop 6y ago

True. Feels like the concept of looking for inflation by watching the price of milk and bread makes no sense when the supply/demand curve is hiding the fact that we have an extreme overproduction of both ready to go, but kept from the market in order to avoid harming the market. On the other hand everyone is putting every last excess dollar they have into the stock market because banks can’t offer interest, so prices are exploding without any grip on reality.

jopsen 6y ago

> blood-bath that will ensue if rates were increased to a reasonable level. Any reason to think that'll happen? Won't assets inflation just stay and maybe level off.. my point is: nobody is going to pull money out of stocks to buy bread and milk. Isn't stonks the best thing to hold, if we have inflation.

solaxun 6y ago
It's a complicated relationship, but yes stocks generally perform well in inflationary environments, certainly better than bonds which unequivocally get crushed. However, often what happens along with rate increases is tighter lending standards, increased borrowing costs, less ability to refinance at attractive rates, etc. It's also more difficult to raise equity when investors have reasonable alternatives in other asset classes. Suddenly investors start caring about tired and old things like "valuation" again, and "price to eyeballs" or "tweets per minute" matter less. For companies that have been riding the wave of free money in perpetuity, that's a bitter pill to swallow - when it's time to refinance they aren't prepared to pay the new bill. More dangerously, they simply may not be able to refinance at all if credit markets dry up (2008), and that is when it gets really ugly. Stock prices are as high as they are right now because there are no reasonable alternatives. It's the "least bad" option.
- jopsen 6y ago
  So as long as the fed can increase money supply, the dance continues -- and holding stonks is fine. Once the dance stops, which might be a while... Then you'll want to be holding assets of actual value. What happens to inflation when money supply dries out?
- stevofolife 6y ago
  I thought interest rates and rate of inflation have an inverse relationship.
  - solaxun 6y ago
    nominal interest = real interest + inflation

bko 6y ago

Does anyone else feel like inflation is under-reported on a personal level? After barber shops opened I was surprised my barber increased his prices from $25 -> $40. I poked my head in a few other barber shops and they've had similar price increases. I think restaurants also increased their prices. I remember restaurants where the prices were $14-17 for most dishes now charge ~$18-22 Of course this is purely anecdotal.

enjeyw 6y ago
Not sure if it was a typo, but I think you’re looking for the word “anecdotal” not “antidotal” (coming from someone who messes these kinda things up all the time)
- bko 6y ago
  Yup, corrected. Thanks!
pfranz 6y ago
Personally, I haven't noticed in the price of goods. I wouldn't be surprised if services increased their price since we're still in the middle of a pandemic. I imagine the flow of customers are down (I love restaurants but don't have any immediate interest in going to that or a barber shop) and the people going are more motivated than the average customer hence willing to pay more. I also think a price increase might be done because of sympathies knowing those kinds of businesses are struggling.
dragonwriter 6y ago
Barber shops and restaurants are a fairly small part of what people spend money on (especially with COVID) and have seen a big drop in unit sales across which to spread fixed costs. So, inflation there is higher than general inflation. Inflation across different sectors varies a lot; the overall level is a aggregate but not one around which the sector-specific numbers cluster tightly. https://www.bls.gov/news.release/archives/cpi_02102021.htm https://www.bls.gov/news.release/archives/cpi_02102021.htm

confidantlake 6y ago

Also housing, healthcare, and college tuition.

dragonwriter 6y ago

> I think we are experiencing extreme inflation, just not in CPI goods, but rather capital assets Assets don't provide direct utility, asset price inflation isn't inflation as that term is understood without modification, the same reason that producer price inflation and other inflation outside of consumer goods and services is. It's definitely a thing that occurs, but it doesn't have the same effects and trying to conflate them is just equivocation. > Just look at the IPO landscape, The cycles in the IPO landscape and stock market trends for fairly early-stage but post-IPO firms probably relates more to waves of enthusiasm about promising new immature sectors (and the erosion of those enthusiasms) than monetary policy; the dotcom boom had all the same things you say about the current time, despite much tighter monetary policy with Fed funds rates in the 5% range rather than hovering around 0%.

bcrl 6y ago

In my family, we see it in our food bills. Due to COVID, most other expenses are down, as we drive less, and don't go out to our normal activities (everything from coffee, to restaurants, movies, even just stopping in a corner store on the drive home). However, our food bills are almost double what they were a few years ago. The worst part is that packages of standard food items keep getting smaller which hides this effect in some of the inflation indices - just look at the weight of a package of cookies, or the cost of a pound of beef. But, hey, at least the increase in housing prices is hidden by ridiculously low interest rates.

dominotw 6y ago
> we see it in our food bills I saw this too but ppl point me to govt figures for inflation and its never matches what i experience personally.
- londons_explore 6y ago
  My government is pretty expert at changing the method to calculate official inflation figures to make them look lower. Sometimes we include housing, sometimes not. Sometimes we include loan interest, sometimes not... Etc. They are also expert at issuing provisional figures that are usually revised upwards retrospectively many years later.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]