The markets sway to the rhythm of the central banks, but it’s not clear that monetary policy alone can solve the serious economic problems affecting most of the planet. Perhaps it would be a good thing to take heed of Summers idea that it is preferable to back productive investment and not the creation of bubbles supported by low interest rates.
James Alexander via Historinhas | There is only monetary policy, defined as the value of money relative to real goods and services. All else is just tools: official short term policy rates, IOER, targeting or guidance, QE, fiscal policy. In the “monetary offset”, the tool of expansionary fiscal policy is offset if the overarching policy tool is inflation targeting.
The international consultative Group of Thirty (G30), whose members are central bankers and bankers from big private banks, has just released a report. They conclude much work remains ahead for governments and central banks to secure a solid recovery.
On face value, the ruthless tools used by central bankers to inject piles of money into the economy point to a brand new way of conducting monetary policy. Never before, except for in wartime, did they dare to trigger such massive asset-buying programmes. And never before did they so blatantly disregard the future risks a huge liquidity glut might fuel.
It is a simple story of failure, but one that fits the facts. It´s also based on a simple premise: An inflation obsession that took hold in 1974.
By Fernando Barciela | Board member at Ferrovial, amongst other Spanish listed companies, Juan Arena was President of Bankinter from 2002 to 2007. “The crisis comes when assets prices drop. Then we have to choose between debt haircuts or raising asset prices via inflation and money printing,” he says.
The Fed’s wavering over addressing the matter of its announced rate hike has badly affected the markets, increasing their volatility. It should act now, curbing any further speculation, and disregard recent calls from the IMF and the World Bank to further delay this move.
Being one of the very few countries (two others are Poland and Israel) whose monetary policy managed to avoid a recession on the heels of the 2008-09 crisis, Australia is a natural object of Schadenfreude!
Are we putting the responsilibity of exiting the crisis on central banks’ shoulders? Is ECB’s president Mario Draghi doing traders a favour by playing down the ECB’s responsibility for contributing to volatility? Professor of Financial Mathematics at Bocconi’s University Marcello Minenna answers to these questions from Milan and argues that a low interest rate environment is here to stay.
By James Alexander via Historinhas | Although it appeared that the VSPs gathered in Jackson Hole could only worry about non-existent inflation, I detected a defensiveness too.