Em Novembro rumo a Amesterdão.
Em tempo de partida - breve, é certo - sinto que há coisas que têm vindo a perder o seu sentido. Tudo tem o seu tempo!
The blog is Dead!
RAM
Doors - The End]
Quinta-feira, Outubro 16, 2008
Segunda-feira, Outubro 13, 2008
Krugman, a crise e o Nobel...
Nem de proposito. Acabava eu de ler o artigo de Paul Krugman publicado na edição de hoje do New York Times, quando recebo um mail do Times a anunciar a atribuição do Premio Nobel da Economia
Não sendo eu um especialista em economia, confesso que ja alguns anos sigo os seus escritos neste jornal Norte-Americano, e, mais recentemente, no seu blog, revendo-me, quase integralmente, nas suas analises quer economicas, quer politicas.
Professor da Universidade de Princeton, e com passagem pelas principais Universidades da Ivy League, o vasto trabalho desenvolvido tendo por base a "new trade theory," principalmente nos tempos de crise vividos nos mercados financeiros, mais do que justifica o Premio Nobel.
Deixo aqui a analise de hoje.
RAM
Gordon Does Good
By PAUL KRUGMAN
Has Gordon Brown, the British prime minister, saved the world financial system?
O.K., the question is premature — we still don’t know the exact shape of the planned financial rescues in Europe or for that matter the United States, let alone whether they’ll really work. What we do know, however, is that Mr. Brown and Alistair Darling, the chancellor of the Exchequer (equivalent to our Treasury secretary), have defined the character of the worldwide rescue effort, with other wealthy nations playing catch-up.
This is an unexpected turn of events. The British government is, after all, very much a junior partner when it comes to world economic affairs. It’s true that London is one of the world’s great financial centers, but the British economy is far smaller than the U.S. economy, and the Bank of England doesn’t have anything like the influence either of the Federal Reserve or of the European Central Bank. So you don’t expect to see Britain playing a leadership role.
But the Brown government has shown itself willing to think clearly about the financial crisis, and act quickly on its conclusions. And this combination of clarity and decisiveness hasn’t been matched by any other Western government, least of all our own.
What is the nature of the crisis? The details can be insanely complex, but the basics are fairly simple. The bursting of the housing bubble has led to large losses for anyone who bought assets backed by mortgage payments; these losses have left many financial institutions with too much debt and too little capital to provide the credit the economy needs; troubled financial institutions have tried to meet their debts and increase their capital by selling assets, but this has driven asset prices down, reducing their capital even further.
What can be done to stem the crisis? Aid to homeowners, though desirable, can’t prevent large losses on bad loans, and in any case will take effect too slowly to help in the current panic. The natural thing to do, then — and the solution adopted in many previous financial crises — is to deal with the problem of inadequate financial capital by having governments provide financial institutions with more capital in return for a share of ownership.
This sort of temporary part-nationalization, which is often referred to as an “equity injection,” is the crisis solution advocated by many economists — and sources told The Times that it was also the solution privately favored by Ben Bernanke, the Federal Reserve chairman.
But when Henry Paulson, the U.S. Treasury secretary, announced his plan for a $700 billion financial bailout, he rejected this obvious path, saying, “That’s what you do when you have failure.” Instead, he called for government purchases of toxic mortgage-backed securities, based on the theory that ... actually, it never was clear what his theory was.
Meanwhile, the British government went straight to the heart of the problem — and moved to address it with stunning speed. On Wednesday, Mr. Brown’s officials announced a plan for major equity injections into British banks, backed up by guarantees on bank debt that should get lending among banks, a crucial part of the financial mechanism, running again. And the first major commitment of funds will come on Monday — five days after the plan’s announcement.
At a special European summit meeting on Sunday, the major economies of continental Europe in effect declared themselves ready to follow Britain’s lead, injecting hundreds of billions of dollars into banks while guaranteeing their debts. And whaddya know, Mr. Paulson — after arguably wasting several precious weeks — has also reversed course, and now plans to buy equity stakes rather than bad mortgage securities (although he still seems to be moving with painful slowness).
As I said, we still don’t know whether these moves will work. But policy is, finally, being driven by a clear view of what needs to be done. Which raises the question, why did that clear view have to come from London rather than Washington?
It’s hard to avoid the sense that Mr. Paulson’s initial response was distorted by ideology. Remember, he works for an administration whose philosophy of government can be summed up as “private good, public bad,” which must have made it hard to face up to the need for partial government ownership of the financial sector.
I also wonder how much the Femafication of government under President Bush contributed to Mr. Paulson’s fumble. All across the executive branch, knowledgeable professionals have been driven out; there may not have been anyone left at Treasury with the stature and background to tell Mr. Paulson that he wasn’t making sense.
Luckily for the world economy, however, Gordon Brown and his officials are making sense. And they may have shown us the way through this crisis.
Não sendo eu um especialista em economia, confesso que ja alguns anos sigo os seus escritos neste jornal Norte-Americano, e, mais recentemente, no seu blog, revendo-me, quase integralmente, nas suas analises quer economicas, quer politicas.
Professor da Universidade de Princeton, e com passagem pelas principais Universidades da Ivy League, o vasto trabalho desenvolvido tendo por base a "new trade theory," principalmente nos tempos de crise vividos nos mercados financeiros, mais do que justifica o Premio Nobel.
Deixo aqui a analise de hoje.
RAM
Gordon Does Good
By PAUL KRUGMAN
Has Gordon Brown, the British prime minister, saved the world financial system?
O.K., the question is premature — we still don’t know the exact shape of the planned financial rescues in Europe or for that matter the United States, let alone whether they’ll really work. What we do know, however, is that Mr. Brown and Alistair Darling, the chancellor of the Exchequer (equivalent to our Treasury secretary), have defined the character of the worldwide rescue effort, with other wealthy nations playing catch-up.
This is an unexpected turn of events. The British government is, after all, very much a junior partner when it comes to world economic affairs. It’s true that London is one of the world’s great financial centers, but the British economy is far smaller than the U.S. economy, and the Bank of England doesn’t have anything like the influence either of the Federal Reserve or of the European Central Bank. So you don’t expect to see Britain playing a leadership role.
But the Brown government has shown itself willing to think clearly about the financial crisis, and act quickly on its conclusions. And this combination of clarity and decisiveness hasn’t been matched by any other Western government, least of all our own.
What is the nature of the crisis? The details can be insanely complex, but the basics are fairly simple. The bursting of the housing bubble has led to large losses for anyone who bought assets backed by mortgage payments; these losses have left many financial institutions with too much debt and too little capital to provide the credit the economy needs; troubled financial institutions have tried to meet their debts and increase their capital by selling assets, but this has driven asset prices down, reducing their capital even further.
What can be done to stem the crisis? Aid to homeowners, though desirable, can’t prevent large losses on bad loans, and in any case will take effect too slowly to help in the current panic. The natural thing to do, then — and the solution adopted in many previous financial crises — is to deal with the problem of inadequate financial capital by having governments provide financial institutions with more capital in return for a share of ownership.
This sort of temporary part-nationalization, which is often referred to as an “equity injection,” is the crisis solution advocated by many economists — and sources told The Times that it was also the solution privately favored by Ben Bernanke, the Federal Reserve chairman.
But when Henry Paulson, the U.S. Treasury secretary, announced his plan for a $700 billion financial bailout, he rejected this obvious path, saying, “That’s what you do when you have failure.” Instead, he called for government purchases of toxic mortgage-backed securities, based on the theory that ... actually, it never was clear what his theory was.
Meanwhile, the British government went straight to the heart of the problem — and moved to address it with stunning speed. On Wednesday, Mr. Brown’s officials announced a plan for major equity injections into British banks, backed up by guarantees on bank debt that should get lending among banks, a crucial part of the financial mechanism, running again. And the first major commitment of funds will come on Monday — five days after the plan’s announcement.
At a special European summit meeting on Sunday, the major economies of continental Europe in effect declared themselves ready to follow Britain’s lead, injecting hundreds of billions of dollars into banks while guaranteeing their debts. And whaddya know, Mr. Paulson — after arguably wasting several precious weeks — has also reversed course, and now plans to buy equity stakes rather than bad mortgage securities (although he still seems to be moving with painful slowness).
As I said, we still don’t know whether these moves will work. But policy is, finally, being driven by a clear view of what needs to be done. Which raises the question, why did that clear view have to come from London rather than Washington?
It’s hard to avoid the sense that Mr. Paulson’s initial response was distorted by ideology. Remember, he works for an administration whose philosophy of government can be summed up as “private good, public bad,” which must have made it hard to face up to the need for partial government ownership of the financial sector.
I also wonder how much the Femafication of government under President Bush contributed to Mr. Paulson’s fumble. All across the executive branch, knowledgeable professionals have been driven out; there may not have been anyone left at Treasury with the stature and background to tell Mr. Paulson that he wasn’t making sense.
Luckily for the world economy, however, Gordon Brown and his officials are making sense. And they may have shown us the way through this crisis.
Domingo, Outubro 12, 2008
11 de Outubro: na passagem do tempo...
Pode ser que tudo esteja bem no plural
de um mundo intenso. Mas
o amor é outro poder, a carne
vive de sua absorta permanência. Esta vida
de que falo
não se escoa, não alimenta os superlativos
diários. É única
e perene sobre a escondida fluência
dos movimentos.
[...]
Herberto Helder
de um mundo intenso. Mas
o amor é outro poder, a carne
vive de sua absorta permanência. Esta vida
de que falo
não se escoa, não alimenta os superlativos
diários. É única
e perene sobre a escondida fluência
dos movimentos.
[...]
Herberto Helder
Quarta-feira, Outubro 08, 2008
Sinais do tempo...
Cada um procura como pode ou como lhe ocorre as raízes de que carece. Uns, enxertando-se em troncos alheios; outros, implantando-se na própria terra.
Gonzalo Torrente Balllester
Gonzalo Torrente Balllester
Sexta-feira, Outubro 03, 2008
As cidades...
Era, sobretudo a paisagem, uma das minhas imagens mais queridas, e o conhecimento que dela tinha poderia explicar-se pelo que diz Ortega de como se conhecem bem as cidades onde se amou.
Gonzalo Torrente Ballester
Gonzalo Torrente Ballester
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