Inflation Versus Hyperinflation -- The Crucial Difference

From Taipan Publishing Group
and Max Keiser.

...That is one of the great ironies at this juncture of financial history. The deflation monster still has not been vanquished! It is simply hiding under the bed, biding its time until the Fed-and-China-created stimulus bubble pops.

And when that bubble DOES pop, that's when things get really frightening. When the global economy endures some domino chain combination of Japan/Middle East/China/America implosion, the threat of Great Depression 2.0 comes roaring back, bigger and uglier than before (as all the extend and pretend actions taken until now have only made the problems worse).

That is the point where true panic comes in... when the attempt to stop "normal" inflation triggers an economic collapse that rivals Great Depression conditions. At that juncture, it will be apparent to all that the Federal Reserve has run out of bullets... that "more stimulus" simply cannot work... that trillions have already been thrown down the drain.

It is then, when the monetary authorities wet their pants in the face of a new deflationary panic, that the real threat of hyperinflation returns to the fore. If all hope becomes lost in a hopeless situation, we could see the Fed desperately propose something like QE2 times 10, on the order of not $600 billion but $6 trillion. That is when the real horror would begin...

Read more.

Bernanke: We will not allow inflation to rise...

A clearly concerned and stressed Bernanke talks on 60 Minutes. He shows off the gold meeting hall of the Federal Reserve. Like everything else out of America today, the episode gives the unsettling feeling of standing on a historical precipice.

From Zerohedge and Washington's Blog



...There are certainly a lot of interesting things to say about Bernanke's words.

But I think the real story is how nervous Bernanke appears.

Listen to his voice, and watch his lips quaver:


Link to Video.

Quantitative Easing Explained

How Hyperinflation Will Happen

Who knows if it really will work out like this person says, but it's worth a read.



From Zerohedge.

Yields are low, unemployment up, CPI numbers are down (and under some metrics, negative)—in short, everything screams “deflation”.

Therefore, the notion of talking about hyperinflation now, in this current macro-economic environment, would seem . . . well . . . crazy. Right?

Wrong: I would argue that the next step down in this world-historical Global Depression which we are experiencing will be hyperinflation...

The Death of Paper Money

An interesting article by Ambrose Evans-Pritchard from The Telegraph.

As they prepare for holiday reading in Tuscany, City bankers are buying up rare copies of an obscure book on the mechanics of Weimar inflation published in 1974.

Ebay is offering a well-thumbed volume of "Dying of Money: Lessons of the Great German and American Inflations" at a starting bid of $699 (shipping free.. thanks a lot).
The crucial passage comes in Chapter 17 entitled "Velocity". Each big inflation -- whether the early 1920s in Germany, or the Korean and Vietnam wars in the US -- starts with a passive expansion of the quantity money. This sits inert for a surprisingly long time. Asset prices may go up, but latent price inflation is disguised. The effect is much like lighter fuel on a camp fire before the match is struck.

People’s willingness to hold money can change suddenly for a "psychological and spontaneous reason" , causing a spike in the velocity of money. It can occur at lightning speed, over a few weeks. The shift invariably catches economists by surprise. They wait too long to drain the excess money...