BACK TO THE FISCAL FRONT.  With the dust settling after the FOMC tweaks, market attention invariably returns to budget negotiations.  For an understanding as to how negotiations might pan out we need to look beyond macroeconomics (which tells us to simply get a deal done: sooner as opposed to later) and into game theory. “Games” like the Prisoner’s Dilemma are examples of self …

The New Zealand dollar fell from a nine-month high amid concerns politicians in Washington are making no progress in talks to avert the fiscal cliff, countering the impetus growth assets got from the Federal Reserve’s further quantitative easing and weighing on stocks. The kiwi dollar fell to 84.23 US cents from 84.40 cents at 5pm in Wellington yesterday. The trade-weighted …

Wall Street declined as US House Speaker John Boehner renewed concern about the lack of progress in talks aimed at preventing US$600 billion in tax increases and spending cuts taking effect on January 1. “Unfortunately, the White House is so unserious about cutting spending that it appears willing to slow-walk our economy right up to the ‘fiscal cliff,'” Boehner told a …