Plain Bagel QandA 4 | P/E, QE, and Short-Term Needs

The Plain Bagel Q&A 4More Details on QE:QE is a concerted effort to provide additional monetary stimulus to the economy in order to light a fire under it and get growth increasing again. If we look back at recent history, during and for a long period after the financial crisis of 08/09, the central banks dropped their key interest rates to zero or virtually zero. They did this in order to incentivize the commercial banking system to borrow free money and then easily lend that same money out into the financial system for an easy profit for themselves. However, this didn’t work so well because, although the banks did borrow the free money, they then horded this free money in low to moderate risk investments without really investing and lending the funds into the real economy. At this point, this is where QE came into a necessary realization and effect.As mentioned, central banks (in effect) increase their own bank account balances and then buy various financial securities from commercial banks and other institutional investors. This effectively lowers longer-term interest rates (not short-term rates which are again already virtually zero) by artificially inflating the prices of the securities being bought by the QE operations. This in effect makes most government backed or guaranteed securities prevail at artificially and abnormally low yields (same interest payment, but higher prices). As a corollary, these same securities by default become much less attractive to any private market investor. In connecting the dots, as a final result, this will encourage both institutional and retail investors to put their money into more risky investments like stocks and corporate bonds, and this will eventually boost the stock market. Episode Music:Marty Gots a Plan by Kevin MacLeod is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/)Source: http://incompetech.com/music/royalty-free/index.html?isrc=USUAN1100671Artist: http://incompetech.com/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices