(12-21-2017 03:39 PM)tanqtonic Wrote:  The Fed seems to be jonesing hard to get back to managed small inflation. Quite the change in path they had to take since 2008 to run a money spigots turned on all the way without meaningful inflation issues to counter what could have been a truly devastating deflationary series of events.

Yup. For me, QE1 and QE2 were hard to swallow but, overall, necessary. The Fed is trying to get back to some sense of normalcy before the next recession so it has some bullets to deal with that situation. The US is better shape with that than Europe. Draghi and the Germans are still dealing with negative rates.

The yield curve is dangerously close to inverting. Once that happens, the next recession is close behind.