LISBON | By Diário de Notícias via Presseurop | The International Monetary Fund (IMF) believes that austerity measures taken until now are sufficient to fulfill the deficit targets set for this year and the next, but anticipates more cuts for 2015, writes Diário de Notícias.
SAO PAULO | By Marcus Nunes | It is encouraging that Obama may soon have to fill up to 5 slots in the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve. Maybe it´s expecting too much that he´ll think that´s a very important thing to happen at times like the present. He´s already ‘failed’ in a previous instance when he had 3 slots to fill, leaving them open for a long time and even failing to get an appointee approved! The low quality of some recent Fed Governors is glaring.
SAO PAULO | By Marcus Nunes | Professor of Economics James Hamilton reviews new research on “Summarizing monetary policy.” He talks about the existence of a “shadow” short-term interest rate in the U.S. economy that might in some circumstances be quite negative.
MADRID | By Adrianna Rodriguez* | The past year has been rocky for the United States, to say the least: Edward Snowden released the most significant leak in recent history; German leaders now think twice about their after hours phone calls, and the US spent about $24 billion on a national tantrum. It’s simpler to say that the country has finally lost all credibility in European eyes, however, that’s not necessarily the case. How is it that Washington can go through all this nonsense and still appear on top?
LONDON | By London analysts | Since the end of the most recent recession, US consumer confidence has remained on an upward trend, despite several negative shocks from government policy. Given this track record, we expect the fall in confidence related to the federal shutdown to be short-lived.
BEIJING | By Caixin Magazine | The third plenum of the Communist Party’s 18th Central Committee will start on November 9. Hopes are high that significant reform measures will be unveiled after the meeting. Here is what Zhu Haibin, chief China economist at investment bank JPMorgan, expects to see. He also explains why the success of the meeting will be determined by what comes next.
THE CORNER TEAM | Put the champagne in the freezer. Against most expectations, the ECB lowered its main refinancing rate to 0.25 percent on Thursday in order to encourage the eurozone’s recovery. Mario Draghi took this measure responding to a slump in inflation that has sparked fears the economy could stall, years after financial crisis broke and years after most other central banks did the same thing.
SAO PAULO | By Marcus Nunes | For less bounce! The Philly Fed has called the measure of GDP obtained from “crushing” the usual measure of GDP (expenditure based) and the income-based measure GDI GDP plus…
MEXICO CITY | By David Brunat | Latin America is on its way to give a lesson to the European Union in terms of employment. By the end of the year the subcontinent is to hit a 6.2% jobless rate, a record low, according to a shared report issued by the Economic Comission for Latin America and the Caribben (ECLAC) and the International Labour Organization (ILO). The region has already reached a 6.6% rate in the third quarter, while in the EU Spain, Portugal and Greece are approaching a staggering 30%. Latin America’s jobless rate is even lower than that of the United States (7.3%).