One of the harder things to do these days is to try and make sense of all the contradictory statements and data.

Earlier this week, we found out that mass layoff actions were up sharply in August.  But today we found out that unemployment claims have been trending down for months.  Which is right?  Can they both be right?

First, the mass layoff data:

The Federal Reserve policy statement yesterday was a masterful blend of contradictory words and ideas.

I don’t know what else to say at this point, other than that everyone had better be ready for massive inflation..

For the record, I do not ascribe to the simplistic views of “either/or” when it comes to the great inflation vs. deflation debate.  When I am asked about which outcome I favor, I say “yes.”

What I mean by this somewhat flippant comment is that I can easily envision some assets declining in price (worthless CDOs anyone?  McMansions?) even as I see other things rising dramatically in price.

I’ve alluded to this before, and now the evidence for a liquidity flood is presented below:

Aside from a critically important family meeting I attended this weekend, I spent the rest of the time this weekend, and through today, working on the latest Martenson Report, which should be out by tomorrow morning at the latest.  The report will be on housing and where we stand with respect to prices, inventory, liquidity, and demand. In terms of where we are headed economically, housing ranks as one of the most vital issues of the day.

The Treasury International Capital data for July came out this morning, and it once again revealed a far larger outflow of money than anyone expected.

In fact, for a country borrowing as much as the US, anything less than a few hundred billion to the positive every month is a really big problem.  If you’ve been wondering why the dollar has been going down, here’s part of your answer….money is flooding out of the US.

In the continuing theme of keeping our eye firmly fixed to the periphery of the financial universe, watching for clues that things are about to change, we note that Poland recently suffered a bond auction failure.

Why doesn’t Poland just print up the money from their central bank and buy them themselves, like the US and the UK?

I don’t really know.  When the Federal Reserve does this, there seems to be no impact on the dollar, interest rates, or bond prices, so perhaps the Polish central bankers should go to the US for a tour of the facilities and learn which buttons they need to push, and in which order, to accomplish the miracle results the US has enjoyed.

There was an important question in the comment area from Tim_P about how Barrick might have lost so much money in their gold hedging, or if they even did.

First the question, then my answer.