Global capital is looking for a place to hide. But after decades of enthusiastic currency creation and financial engineering, there’s way too much of it for any one country to accommodate. This mismatch between money knocking at the door and available space is leading the handful of remaining safe havens to put up “no vacancy” signs in order to avoid being swamped. Among the things they’re trying is negative interest rates. That is, if you want to deposit money in a Swiss or Danish bank or lend money to the Japanese or German governments you now have to pay them for the privilege.
This sounds a little crazy, and from a historical perspective it is indeed highly unusual. But it’s exactly what you’d expect in a world of ever-increasing debt and ever-more-exotic financial speculation: Too much bad paper gets created which eventually blows up, causes instability and leads worried investors to value return of capital over return on capital. They all pile into whatever seems most likely to still exist a decade hence, forcing (or enabling) the managers of those assets to charge rather than pay interest. Here’s a sampling of recent stories on the subject:
Less Than Zero: When Interest Rates Go Negative
In Denmark, Depositors to Pay Interest to Bank
Negative interest rates are hammering Germany’s savings banks
Riksbank Preview: Next in Line for Negative Interest Rates?
Swiss Impose Negative Rate Echoing 1970s Amid Russia Crisis
Get Ready For Negative Interest Rates In The US
Now, there are lots of interesting sub-topics to explore in a world of negative interest rates. But let’s start with the role of gold. Traditionally the ultimate safe haven, it is the one form of money that can’t be messed with and therefore the place to be when the messing gets out of hand.
Lately, for instance, it has spiked in countries with emerging currency crises. In Russia, Argentina, Greece and in fact the entire eurozone, the local-currency price of gold has risen faster even than the exchange rate of safe haven currencies like the US dollar and Swiss franc. And with interest rates going negative in much of the world, a person with capital to allocate confronts a new and very interesting risk/return calculus. Consider:
