Money growth trends in the USA have been astonishing in the last three months, says the Institute of International Monetary Research.

Already 2019 had seen an acceleration in annual broad money growth (to over 8 percent at the end of the year) compared with a norm of about 4 percent for most of the macro-economically very stable and non-inflationary 2010s.

But the coronavirus-related lockdown has caused policymakers to throw caution to the winds. The Institute estimates that the rise in M3 in the three months March to April 2020 comes to almost 16 percent, equivalent to an annualized rate of increase of 80 percent.

Says Professor Tim Congdon,Professor Tim Congdon Chairman of the Institute of International Monetary Research at the University of Buckingham: Last month I conjectured that 2020 might see the highest annual rate of increase in US money, broadly-defined, in modern peacetime history. I would overlook the "Continental" inflation of the late 1770s just after Independence and the inflation in the Confederacy during the Civil War.

With these exclusions, a number of 19 percent in 1919, just after the First World War, became the previous peak.

I must now report that the increase in the year to April 2020 – on the Shadow Government Statistics figures – was 20.5 percent and so constituted a new all-time high. If I am right in forecasting a 3¾ percent M3 jump in May, the annual increase will advance to almost 24 percent.

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Money growth trends in the USA have been astonishing in the last three months, says the Institute of International Monetary Research.

Already 2019 had seen an acceleration in annual broad money growth (to over 8 percent at the end of the year) compared with a norm of about 4 percent for most of the macro-economically very stable and non-inflationary 2010s.

But the coronavirus-related lockdown has caused policymakers to throw caution to the winds. The Institute estimates that the rise in M3 in the three months March to April 2020 comes to almost 16 percent, equivalent to an annualized rate of increase of 80 percent.

Says Professor Tim Congdon,Professor Tim Congdon Chairman of the Institute of International Monetary Research at the University of Buckingham: Last month I conjectured that 2020 might see the highest annual rate of increase in US money, broadly-defined, in modern peacetime history. I would overlook the "Continental" inflation of the late 1770s just after Independence and the inflation in the Confederacy during the Civil War.

With these exclusions, a number of 19 percent in 1919, just after the First World War, became the previous peak.

I must now report that the increase in the year to April 2020 – on the Shadow Government Statistics figures – was 20.5 percent and so constituted a new all-time high. If I am right in forecasting a 3¾ percent M3 jump in May, the annual increase will advance to almost 24 percent.