There can be little doubt that negative interest rate policies (NIRP) are now a distinct possibility after the Fed backed down from raising the Fed Funds Rate at their September meeting, having prepared markets well in advance for the event.

Those who have followed the advice of the major investment houses must be badly bruised.

The sudden end of the Fed’s ambition to raise interest rates above the zero bound, coupled with the FOMC’s minutes, which expressed concerns about emerging market economies, has got financial scribblers writing about negative interest rate policies (NIRP).

For the moment investors are in shock, seeking reassurance and keenly intent on preserving their diminishing assets, instead of reflecting on the broader economic reasons behind it.

While gold consolidated its recent gains, silver was sold down this week along with other metals and energy.

This week market relationships underwent a sea-change, with a sudden realisation that the global economy is in a deepening crisis.

On the New York Stock Exchange margin debt has hit all-time records at $500bn, roughly double that at the top of the dot-com bubble in 2000 when valuations rose to the highest ever recorded.

Crucially, the assumption in capital markets that gold is no longer money but just an asset or commodity has all but destroyed our understanding of its monetary relationships.

In the media warm-up for Wednesday’s UK budget, we were told of Britain’s poor productivity and Chancellor Osborne subsequently confirmed that his priority is to address it.

As I wrote last week, in the run-up to the half-year precious metals’ prices face a conflict between window-dressing for the lowest possible valuation, and the systemic risk that is Greece.

Hedge funds and high-frequency traders have finally forced gold into a US dollar loss this year as shown in our introductory chart, but silver is still in positive territory.

Currency devaluation is seen by nearly every macro-economist to be the cure for trade deficits. This widespread assumption is easily demonstrated to be incorrect.