Quote from Ivanovich:
Make no mistake, the Euro will breach the 1.60 mark. It's just a matter of when.
Trichet was on today with his "same ol'" commentary about how inflation is here and how they need to pay attention to inflationary pressures. Nevermind that he's not smart enough to realize that whenever he drives the Euro up and dollar down, oil and commodities follow with it, thereby creating the very inflation he's worried about.
Spain is about to crack. Italy is in a recession already. Ireland's housing market is under extreme stress and not a day goes by that France doesn't downgrade some economic indicator. Today it was GDP to 1.6.
But Germany is doing fine! That's all that matters to the ECB![]()
You have to realize that this is a game of chicken. Its been started by the Fed, mind you. And there is no underlying fundamental reason why Trichet should submit to all those inflationary pressures that are generated by dollar printing. Its just something that our American friends have to eat themselves, and even though they invited the Europeans and the Japanese, its a dinner invitation that will be passed. Especially because the food served there just stinks from a mile.
I think Trichet does the right thing here. You are making the mistake of only seeing oil and commodity prices in dollar terms. If you look at the prices in euro terms, you'll find that even though there has been significant appreciation, its far from a cause to alarm. Plus, its a very journalistic-populistic thing to say that Trichet is driving the euro up. His not driving anything up, Bernanke is driving down the dollar. That means that the euro appreciates compared to the dollar. Trichet has nothing to do with this, especially because its quite apparent that he is not playing along Benny's puppeteers' will.
