Stocks Drop, Trade Flounders, & Gas Prices Tank: Let People Prosper Episode 56

In this Let People Prosper episode, let's discuss the large selloff in the stock market as international trade issues along with some signs of slower economic growth and higher interest rates give traders anxiety while incorporating how these influence lower gasoline prices. If you want to learn more, you don't want to miss this full episode. Thanks for watching and sharing with your friends and family! I'm truly blessed to have such amazing support. 

While there have been some potential good signs on the trade front with a possible agreement between President Trump and President Xi, there continues to be much uncertainty about the actual agreement and the fact that it is only good for 90 days and does little to reduce higher imposed cost of trade between the two countries. In general, this needless trade dispute is far from resolved and has contributed to a steep drop in the stock market today, but there are some promising aspects of the agreement.

“Just because the U.S. and China have agreed to call a truce in their trade war doesn’t mean that it’s over: This was a classic exercise in can-kicking,” economist Tyler Cowen explains in Bloomberg Opinion. “Nonetheless, most cans have quite a few kicks in them, and overall this is good news for the global economy. Instead of sweeping everything under the rug, as was the case before Donald Trump took office, America and China have found a new way of addressing conflict by talking openly.”

According to the Wall Street Journal, "at the meeting in Argentina, Mr. Trump and his negotiators agreed to suspend a planned Jan. 1 increase in tariffs on $200 billion in Chinese goods to 25%, from 10%, as the two sides negotiate over Chinese economic policies."
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Overall, tariffs are a destructive and counterproductive trade policy, and both the U.S. and China should work toward reducing them to zero. There’s a lot of work left to do on this deal to ensure that Americans can trade with the Chinese without taxes and uncertainty that will only drive up prices and decrease prosperity. 

This action in the international trade arena has had costs not only of higher prices for Americans because of raising taxes through tariffs but also in raising the value of the dollar. Of course, the dollar market has many factors, which also include the Federal Reserve's potential actions of continuing to raise their overnight lending rate target. As U.S. interest rates go up compared with other countries, which essentially all developed countries have historically low interest rates, and people want to park their currency in dollars to reduce global risk, the value of the dollar appreciates compared with a host of major currencies, particularly the European euro.

When the value of the dollar goes up, the price of oil falls as oil is priced globally in dollars. In other words, a higher valued dollar makes it more expensive for people in other countries to purchase oil so demand falls contributing to a lower price of oil. Also contributing to this is higher inventories of oil from near record levels of production in the U.S. from innovative techniques through fracking.

This has contributed to the lowest level of gasoline prices this year, translating "to savings of about $200 million a day for Americans, said Patrick DeHaan, head of petroleum analysis for GasBuddy. DeHaan predicted that gasoline prices will fall further in coming days, but how long that will last is unclear." Given much of my academic research is in the oil and gas markets, there is much to the story of how the oil market works based on supply, global demand, and precautionary demand primarily driven by geopolitical issues.

Supply is increasing, global demand is waning, and precautionary demand is heightened by the previous two factors outweigh this push upward in price. Considering that gasoline is a byproduct of oil, there is, on average, about a 2% increase in the retail price of gasoline for every 10% increase in the price of oil, and a symmetric response for a decline in the oil price over time. 

Ultimately, imposing tariffs on other countries naturally leads them to do the same to us. And families pay the cost. Instead of resorting to flawed mercantilist trade policy, America should lead the way in promoting free trade, which history shows supports freedom and human flourishing. This should also stabilize the stock market from such wild swings driven by policy uncertainty on a the trade and interest rate fronts. Gaining trust in money issues must also come in the form of reining in bloated federal government spending of taxpayer dollars today and in the future from rising debt.

Achieving freer trade, raising interest rates to a more normal level, and reining in government spending would put the U.S. a sounder foundation for economic growth contributing to more job creation and economic opportunity for more people to prosper.

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