The Great Picture of Folly

Originally posted Thursday, November 22, 2012 Share A notorious experiment with paper money was commenced, to his personal and French national ruin, by John Law in 1717.  This was the very same year that Isaac Newton effectively invented the gold standard, setting...

The Old Lady of Threadneedle Street

Originally posted Thursday, November 15, 2012 Share The Bank of England is the most venerable of the world’s central banks.  It is headquartered in the City of London — England’s version of Wall Street — on Threadneedle Street. And somewhere...

The European Central Bank Revisits Triffin

Originally posted Tuesday, November 13, 2012 Share Belgian economist Robert Triffin was, along with Jacques Rueff, one of the chief critics of the use of the dollar as an international reserve currency.  Triffin and Rueff agreed in their diagnosis of the inherent...