BEIJING | July 10, 2015 | By Alberto Lebrón | Can you imagine a country capable of losing, in just three weeks, nearly five times what Greece owes the Troika? Chinese stock markets have lost ten billion yuan. In euros, that is almost one and a half billion, more than Spain’s entire GDP.
LONDON | June 30, 2015 | By Sigrún Davídsdóttir | Now that Greece has controls on outflow from banks, capital controls, many commentators are comparing Greece to Iceland. There is little comparison to be made between the nature of capital controls in these two countries. The controls are different in every respect except in the name. Iceland had, what I would call, real capital controls – Greece has control on outflow from banks. With the names changed, the difference is clear.
LONDON | March 6, 2015 | By Sigrún Davídsdóttir | Both in Cyprus and Iceland foreign funds flowed into the islands, in the end forcing the government to make use of extreme measures when the tide turned. These measures are normally called ‘capital controls’ which in these two cases hides the fact that the measures used are fundamentally different in all but name. In Iceland, the controls contain the effect of lacking foreign currency, effectively a balance of payment problem – in Cyprus, the controls were a way of defending banks against bank run, i.e. preventing depositors to move funds freely.
ATHENS | By Marios Zachariadis via MacroPolis | While capital controls might be an appropriate intermediate solution for Greece as argued by Professor Sinn in his recent Financial Times note, Professor Sinn misses or misrepresents the picture on a number of counts.
LONDON | By Sigrún Davídsdóttir | Why do the inhabitants of an EU country prefer to keep cash amounting to ca. 6% of GDP hidden at home? Badly burnt after the banking collapse in March 2013 Cypriots neither trust their government nor banks to keep their money safe.