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Gene Ellis

George Soros: how to save the EU from the euro crisis - the speech in full | Business |... - 0 views

  • The crisis has also transformed the European Union into something radically different from what was originally intended. The EU was meant to be a voluntary association of equal states but the crisis has turned it into a hierarchy with Germany and other creditors in charge and the heavily indebted countries relegated to second-class status. While in theory Germany cannot dictate policy, in practice no policy can be proposed without obtaining Germany's permission first.
  • Italy now has a majority opposed to the euro and the trend is likely to grow. There is now a real danger that the euro crisis may end up destroying the European Union.
  • The answer to the first question is extremely complicated because the euro crisis is extremely complex. It has both a political and a financial dimension. And the financial dimension can be divided into at least three components: a sovereign debt crisis and a banking crisis, as well as divergences in competitiveness
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  • The crisis is almost entirely self-inflicted. It has the quality of a nightmare.
  • My interpretation of the euro crisis is very different from the views prevailing in Germany. I hope that by offering you a different perspective I may get you to reconsider your position before more damage is done. That is my goal in coming here.
  • I regarded the European Union as the embodiment of an open society – a voluntary association of equal states who surrendered part of their sovereignty for the common good.
  • The process of integration was spearheaded by a small group of far sighted statesmen who recognised that perfection was unattainable and practiced what Karl Popper called piecemeal social engineering. They set themselves limited objectives and firm timelines and then mobilised the political will for a small step forward, knowing full well that when they achieved it, its inadequacy would become apparent and require a further step.
    • Gene Ellis
       
      Excellent point!
  • Unfortunately, the Maastricht treaty was fundamentally flawed. The architects of the euro recognised that it was an incomplete construct: a currency union without a political union. The architects had reason to believe, however, that when the need arose, the political will to take the next step forward could be mobilized. After all, that was how the process of integration had worked until then.
  • For instance, the Maastricht Treaty took it for granted that only the public sector could produce chronic deficits because the private sector would always correct its own excesses. The financial crisis of 2007-8 proved that wrong.
  • When the Soviet empire started to disintegrate, Germany's leaders realized that reunification was possible only in the context of a more united Europe and they were prepared to make considerable sacrifices to achieve it. When it came to bargaining, they were willing to contribute a little more and take a little less than the others, thereby facilitating agreement.
  • The financial crisis also revealed a near fatal defect in the construction of the euro: by creating an independent central bank, member countries became indebted in a currency they did not control. This exposed them to the risk of default.
  • Developed countries have no reason to default; they can always print money. Their currency may depreciate in value, but the risk of default is practically nonexistent. By contrast, less developed countries that have to borrow in a foreign currency run the risk of default. To make matters worse, financial markets can actually drive such countries into default through bear raids. The risk of default relegated some member countries to the status of a third world country that became over-indebted in a foreign currency. 
    • Gene Ellis
       
      Again, another excellent point!
    • Gene Ellis
       
      Not quite... Maggie Thatcher, a Conservative; and Gordon Brown, of Labour, both recognized this possible loss of sovereignty (and economic policy weapons they might use to keep the UK afloat), and refused to join the euro.
  • The emphasis placed on sovereign credit revealed the hitherto ignored feature of the euro, namely that by creating an independent central bank the euro member countries signed away part of their sovereign status.
  • Only at the end of 2009, when the extent of the Greek deficit was revealed, did the financial markets realize that a member country could actually default. But then the markets raised the risk premiums on the weaker countries with a vengeance.
  • Then the IMF and the international banking authorities saved the international banking system by lending just enough money to the heavily indebted countries to enable them to avoid default but at the cost of pushing them into a lasting depression. Latin America suffered a lost decade.
  • In effect, however, the euro had turned their government bonds into bonds of third world countries that carry the risk of default.
  • In retrospect, that was the root cause of the euro crisis.
  • The burden of responsibility falls mainly on Germany. The Bundesbank helped design the blueprint for the euro whose defects put Germany into the driver's seat.
  • he fact that Greece blatantly broke the rules has helped to support this attitude. But other countries like Spain and Ireland had played by the rules;
  • the misfortunes of the heavily indebted countries are largely caused by the rules that govern the euro.
    • Gene Ellis
       
      Well, yes, but this is an extremely big point.  If, instead of convergence, we continue to see growth patterns growing apart, what then?
  • Germany did not seek the dominant position into which it has been thrust and it is unwilling to accept the obligations and liabilities that go with it.
  • Austerity doesn't work.
  • As soon as the pressure from the financial markets abated, Germany started to whittle down the promises it had made at the height of the crisis.
  • What happened in Cyprus undermined the business model of European banks, which relies heavily on deposits. Until now the authorities went out of their way to protect depositors
  • Banks will have to pay risk premiums that will fall more heavily on weaker banks and the banks of weaker countries. The insidious link between the cost of sovereign debt and bank debt will be reinforced.
  • In this context the German word "Schuld" plays a key role. As you know it means both debt and responsibility or guilt.
  • If countries that abide by the fiscal compact were allowed to convert their entire existing stock of government debt into eurobonds, the positive impact would be little short of the miraculous.
  • Only the divergences in competitiveness would remain unresolved.
  • Germany is opposed to eurobonds on the grounds that once they are introduced there can be no assurance that the so-called periphery countries would not break the rules once again. I believe these fears are misplaced.
  • Losing the privilege of issuing eurobonds and having to pay stiff risk premiums would be a powerful inducement to stay in compliance.
  • There are also widespread fears that eurobonds would ruin Germany's credit rating. eurobonds are often compared with the Marshall Plan.
  • It is up to Germany to decide whether it is willing to authorise eurobonds or not. But it has no right to prevent the heavily indebted countries from escaping their misery by banding together and issuing eurobonds. In other words, if Germany is opposed to eurobonds it should consider leaving the euro and letting the others introduce them.
  • Individual countries would still need to undertake structural reforms. Those that fail to do so would turn into permanent pockets of poverty and dependency similar to the ones that persist in many rich countries.
  • They would survive on limited support from European Structural Funds and remittances
  • Second, the European Union also needs a banking union and eventually a political union.
  • If Germany left, the euro would depreciate. The debtor countries would regain their competitiveness. Their debt would diminish in real terms and, if they issued eurobonds, the threat of default would disappear. 
Gene Ellis

Germany Fights Population Drop - NYTimes.com - 0 views

  • Germany Fights Population Drop
  • But undoing years of subsidies for traditional households is difficult. “Touching those is political suicide,” said Michaela Kreyenfeld of the Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research in Rostock, Germany.
  • Many working mothers find themselves quickly pushed into poorly paid “mini” jobs — perhaps 17 hours a week for about $600 a month. More than four million working women in Germany, about a quarter of the female work force, hold such jobs.
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  • The share of people ages 55 to 64 in the work force had risen to 61.5 percent in 2012, from 38.9 percent in 2002.
  • some executives believe Germany should change its immigration laws and accept foreign credentials
    • Gene Ellis
       
      Note well:  Germany does not now accept foreign credentials??
  • A recent study found that more than half the Greeks and Spaniards who came to Germany left within a year
Gene Ellis

Some thoughts on German politics and the saver's tax in Cyprus | Credit Writedowns - 0 views

  • Now, the large 82.8% German government debt to GDP ratio is a source of shame for many because Germany was a driving force in enshrining the 60% government debt to GDP hurdle into the Maastricht Treaty that set out terms for the euro zone.
  • Moreover, the interest rate policy of the ECB, geared as it was to the slow growth core, produced negative real interest rates and credit bubbles in Spain and Ireland during the last decade. German banks piled in to those countries as prospects domestically stagnated.
  • “The average German worker feels like a cash cow being sucked dry by a quick succession of reforms and bailouts that take money out of her pocket. First it was for reunification, then for European integration, then to right the economy, then to bail out German banks, and finally to bail out the European periphery. Fatigue has set in.”
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  • The bottom line is that none of the major political parties in Germany are going to vote for bailouts for other euro zone countries unless massive strings are attached, since these bailouts are political losers.
  • The anti-bailout part of the FDP platform is the one part of their rhetoric which could successfully take them over the 5% hurdle. The FDP’s complicity in using German taxpayer money to bail out the so-called profligate periphery is a one-way ticket out of Parliament.
  • “First, the Greek reports come via statements made by Michael Fuchs, CDU deputy Bundestag head and a senior member of German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s party. Fuchs warned earlier today that Germany would veto further aid to Greece if the country has not met the conditions of its previous bailouts.
  • “Second, all along Germany has indicated that it is resistant to increasing funding of the ESM and EFSF bailout facilities. This presents a problem in the case of Spain and Italy because of the size of those economies.
  • Willem Buiter, Chief Economist at Citigroup, has been most vocal in predicting that these facilities will be inadequate when Spain and Italy hit the wall and that more extreme measures will have to be taken.
  • The basic dilemma here is that almost all of the eurozone governments including Germany carry high debt burdens in excess of the Maastricht Treaty. For example, Germany has been in breach of Maastricht Treaty in 8 of 10 years since 2002, has been over the Maastricht 60% hurdle in each of those ten years, and now carries a debt to GDP burden above 80%.
  • The long and short of it was that the Germans had reached the end of their ability to support bailouts.
  • All evidence is that this levy has created panic in Cyprus. After all, what is the use of having a deposit guarantee if government can arbitrarily circumvent it to impose losses on your deposits anyway?
  • One can't just blame Cyprus for this fiasco. The ECB, EC and European Union finance ministers signed off on the insured deposit grab too]
  • My view? It was inevitable that we would be in crisis again. The austerity world view of crisis resolution is completely at odds with the capacity of the euro zone’s institutional architecture to handle a crisis.
Gene Ellis

As Prime Russian Trading Partner, Germany Appears Crucial to Ending Crisis - NYTimes.com - 0 views

  • As Prime Russian Trading Partner, Germany Appears Crucial to Ending Crisis
  • Germany is now heavily reliant on Russia for its energy needs, importing more natural gas from Russia than any other country in Europe
  • the German chancellor has called for a more diplomatic solution, preferring more limited actions like many of her European counterparts.
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  • Germany is the second-largest foreign investor in Ukraine behind Cyprus, which is a transit point for Russian money.
  • About three-quarters of the gas and oil that Germany imported in 2013 came from Russia. The country also acts as a major gas transit hub for countries like France.
  • “Germany in particular is dependent on Russian gas,”
Gene Ellis

PrudentBear - 0 views

  • German exporters were major beneficiaries of this growth. German banks and financial institutions helped finance the growth.
  • Exports have provided the majority of Germany’s growth in recent years. Germany is heavily reliant on a narrowly based industrial sector, focused on investment goods—automobiles, industrial machinery, chemicals, electronics and medical devices. These sectors make up a quarter of its GDP and the bulk of exports.
  • Germany’s service sector is weak with lower productivity than comparable countries. While it argues that Greece should deregulate professions, many professions in Germany remain highly regulated. Trades and professions are regulated by complex technical rules and standards rooted in the medieval guild systems. Foreign entrants frequently find these rules difficult and expensive to navigate.
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  • Despite the international standing of Deutsche Bank, Germany’s banking system is fragile. Several German banks required government support during the financial crisis. Highly fragmented (in part due to heavy government involvement) and with low profitability, German banks, especially the German Länder (state) owned Landsbanks, face problems. They have large exposures to European sovereign debt, real estate and structured securities.
  • Prior to 2005, the Landesbanken were able to borrow cheaply, relying on the guarantee of the state governments. The EU ruled these guarantees amounted to subsidies. Before the abolition of the guarantees, the Landesbanks issued large amounts of state-guaranteed loans which mature by December 2015.
  • While it insists on other countries reducing public debt, German debt levels are high—around 81% of GDP. The Bundesbank, Germany’s central bank, has stated that public debt levels will remain above 60% (the level stipulated by European treaties) for many years.
  • Germany’s greatest vulnerability is its financial exposures from the current crisis. German exposure to Europe, especially the troubled peripheral economies, is large.
  • German banks had exposures of around US$500 billion to the debt issues of peripheral nations. While the levels have been reduced, it remains substantial, especially when direct exposures to banks in these countries and indirect exposures via the global financial system are considered. The reduction in risk held by private banks has been offset by the increase in exposure of the German state, which assumed some of this exposure.
  • For example, the exposure of the ECB to Greece, Portugal, Ireland, Spain and Italy is euro 918 billion as of April 2012. This exposure is also rising rapidly, especially driven by capital flight out of these countries.
  • Germany is now caught in a trap. Irrespective of the resolution of the debt crisis, Germany will suffer significant losses on its exposure – it will be the biggest loser.
  • Once the artificial boom ends, voters will discover they were betrayed by Germany’s pro-European political elite. There will be an electoral revolt and, as in the rest of Europe, a strong challenge from radical political forces with unpredictable consequences.
  • In late May 2012, French President Francois Hollande provided a curious argument in support of eurozone bonds: “Is it acceptable that some sovereigns can borrow at 6% and others at zero in the same monetary union?”
  • Political will for integration
  • In the peripheral economies, continued withdrawal of deposits from national banks (a rational choice given currency and confiscation risk) may necessitate either a Europe wide deposit guarantee system or further funding of banks.
  • A credible deposit insurance scheme would have to cover household deposits (say up to euro 100,000), which is around 72% of all deposits, in the peripheral countries. This would entail an insurance scheme for around euro 1.3 trillion of deposits.
  • Given that the Spanish Economy Ministry reports that euro 184 billion in loans to developers are “problematic,” the additional recapitalization needs of Spain’s banks may be as high as euro 200-300 billion in additional funds (20-30% of GDP)
  • A Greek default would result in losses to Germany of up to around euro 90 billion. Germany’s potential losses increase rapidly as more countries default or leave the eurozone.
  • Austerity or default will force many European economies into recession for a prolonged period. German exports will be affected given Europe is around 60% of its market, including around 40% within the eurozone. In case of a break-up of the euro, estimates of German growth range from -1% to below -10%. It is worth remembering that the German economy fell in size by around 5% in 2008, the worst result since the Second World War, mainly on the back of declining exports.
  • For example, Greece owes about euro 400 billion to private bondholders but increasingly to public bodies, such as the IMF and ECB, mainly due to the bailouts. If Greece walks away as some political parties have threatened, then the fallout for the lenders, such as Germany, are potentially calamitous.
  • But the largest single direct German exposure is the Bundesbank’s over euro 700 billion current exposure under the TARGET2 (Trans-European Automated Real-time Gross Settlement Express Transfer System) to other central banks in the Eurozone.
  • by Satyajit Das
Gene Ellis

Are Germans really poorer than Spaniards, Italians and Greeks? | vox - 0 views

  • From this survey it appeared that the median German household had the lowest wealth of all Eurozone countries
  • The median households in countries like Belgium, Spain and Italy appear to be three to four times wealthier than the median German household. Even the median Greek household is twice as wealthy as the German one.
  • mean net wealth of households
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  • A comparison of the median and mean wealth reveals something about the distribution of wealth in each country. If the largest difference is between the mean and the median, the greater is the inequality in the distribution of wealth.
  • In Germany the mean household wealth is almost four times larger than the median.
  • In most other countries this ratio is between 1.5 and 2.
  • We find that in Germany the median household in the top 20% of the income class has 74 times more wealth than the median household in the bottom 20% of the income class. Judged by this criterion Germany has the most unequal distribution of wealth in the Eurozone.
  • Wealth per capita is more than twice as high in northern European countries than in southern countries such as Greece and Portugal.
  • The facts are that Germany is significantly richer than southern Eurozone countries like Spain, Greece and Portugal. There does seem to be a problem of the distribution of wealth in Germany: First, wealth in Germany is highly concentrated in the upper part of the household-income distribution. Second, a large part of German wealth is not held by households and therefore must be held by the corporate sector or the government.
Gene Ellis

Op-Ed Contributor - The Greek crisis shows why Germany should leave the European Moneta... - 0 views

  • THE European Monetary Union, the basis of the euro, began with a grand illusion. On one side were countries — Austria, Finland, Germany and the Netherlands — whose currencies had persistently appreciated, both within Europe and worldwide; the countries on the other side — Belgium, France, Greece, Italy, Portugal and Spain — had persistently depreciating currencies.
  • Rather than pulling the lagging countries forward, the low interest rates of the European Central Bank have lured governments and households, especially in the southern part of the euro zone, into frivolous budgetary policies and excessive consumption.
  • the solution is clear: the only way to avoid further harm to the global economy is for Germany to lead its fellow stable states out of the euro and into a new and stronger currency bloc.
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  • Unlike their northern neighbors, the countries in the zone’s southern half have difficulty placing bonds — issued to finance their national deficits — with international capital investors. Nor are these countries competitive in the global economy, as shown by their high trade deficits.
  • If Greece were outside the euro zone, for example, it could devalue its currency
  • Instead, the fiscal strictures of the euro zone are forcing the country to curtail public expenditures, raise taxes and cut government employees’ salaries, actions that may push Greece into a deep depression and further undermine its already weak international credit standing.
  • In short, th
  • e euro is headed toward collapse.
  • hat opportunity and pull out of the euro, it wouldn’t be alone. The same calculus would probably lure Austria, Finland and the Netherlands — and perhaps France — to leave behind the high-debt states and join Germany in a new, stable bloc, perhaps even with a new common currency.
  • If Germany were to take t
  • A strong-currency bloc could fulfill the euro’s original purpose. Without having to worry about laggard states, the bloc would be able to follow a reliable and consistent monetary policy that would force the member governments to gradually reduce their national debt. The entire European economy would prosper. And the United States would gain an ally in any future reorganization of the world currency system and the global economy.
Gene Ellis

Those Depressing Germans - NYTimes.com - 0 views

  • Last year Germany, not China, ran the world’s biggest current account surplus. And measured as a share of G.D.P., Germany’s surplus was more than twice as large as China’s.
  • Now, it’s true that Germany has been running big surpluses for almost a decade. At first, however, these surpluses were matched by large deficits in southern Europe, financed by large inflows of German capital. Europe as a whole continued to have roughly balanced trade.
  • Instead, however, Germany failed to make any adjustment at all; deficits in Spain, Greece and elsewhere shrank, but Germany’s surplus didn’t.
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  • a country that runs a trade surplus is, to use the old phrase, beggaring its neighbors.
  • It shares a currency with its neighbors, greatly benefiting German exporters, who get to price their goods in a weak euro instead of what would surely have been a soaring Deutsche mark. Yet Germany has failed to deliver on its side of the bargain: To avoid a European depression, it needed to spend more as its neighbors were forced to spend less, and it hasn’t done that.
  • They consider their country a shining role model, to be emulated by all, and the awkward fact that we can’t all run gigantic trade surpluses simply doesn’t register.
Gene Ellis

Germany and EU row over energy subsidies - FT.com - 0 views

  • Germany and EU row over energy subsidies
  • The dispute relates to the billions of euros of German public subsidies deployed to promote the energiewende shift to renewables while at the same time shielding heavy industry from the costs
  • Germany plans to generate up to 60 per cent of its electricity from renewable sources by 2035, as part of a radical shift in energy supply which involves a complete exit from nuclear power. The expansion of clean energy has been encouraged by a generous system of subsidies paid to renewables operators. These have been funded by surcharges that have left Germany with some of the highest household electricity bills in Europe.
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  • There is nothing new in the need to address possible discrimination of imported electricity by Germany,” he said. “If consumers have to pay a surcharge on their consumption of both domestic and imported electricity but revenue from the surcharge is used to only finance domestic electricity producers, there is a risk that imported electricity is disadvantaged and made comparatively more expensive.”
Gene Ellis

"The Euro's Latest Reprieve" by Joseph E. Stiglitz | Project Syndicate - 0 views

  • Like an inmate on death row, the euro has received another last-minute stay of execution. It will survive a little longer. The markets are celebrating, as they have after each of the four previous “euro crisis” summits – until they come to understand that the fundamental problems have yet to be addressed.
  • Europe’s leaders have finally understood that the bootstrap operation by which Europe lends money to the banks to save the sovereigns, and to the sovereigns to save the banks, will not work.
  • Likewise, they now recognize that bailout loans that give the new lender seniority over other creditors worsen the position of private investors, who will simply demand even higher interest rates.CommentsView/Create comment on this paragraph
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  • It is deeply troubling that it took Europe’s leaders so long to see something so obvious
  • What is now proposed is recapitalization of the European Investment Bank, part of a growth package of some $150 billion. But politicians are good at repackaging, and, by some accounts, the new money is a small fraction of that amount, and even that will not get into the system immediately. In short: the remedies – far too little and too late – are based on a misdiagnosis of the problem and flawed economics.
  • Eurobonds and a solidarity fund could promote growth and stabilize the interest rates faced by governments in crisis. Lower interest rates, for example, would free up money so that even countries with tight budget constraints could spend more on growth-enhancing investments.
  • Even well-managed banking systems would face problems in an economic downturn of Greek and Spanish magnitude; with the collapse of Spain’s real-estate bubble, its banks are even more at risk.
  • Europe’s leaders did not recognize this rising danger, which could easily be averted by a common guarantee, which would simultaneously correct the market distortion arising from the differential implicit subsidy.
  • The euro was flawed from the outset, but it was clear that the consequences would become apparent only in a crisis.
  • Workers may leave Ireland or Greece not because their productivity there is lower, but because, by leaving, they can escape the debt burden incurred by their parents.
  • Germany worries that, without strict supervision of banks and budgets, it will be left holding the bag for its more profligate neighbors. But that misses the key point: Spain, Ireland, and many other distressed countries ran budget surpluses before the crisis. The down
  • turn caused the deficits, not the other way around.CommentsView/Create comment on this paragraph
  • If these countries made a mistake, it was only that, like Germany today, they were overly credulous of markets, so they (like the United States and so many others) allowed an asset bubble to grow unchecked.
  • Moreover, Germany is on the hook in either case: if the euro or the economies on the periphery collapse, the costs to Germany will be high.
  • While structural problems have weakened competitiveness and GDP growth in particular countries, they did not bring about the crisis, and addressing them will not resolve it.CommentsView/Create comment on this paragraph
Gene Ellis

Bringer of Prosperity or Bottomless Pit?: Top German Economists Debate the Euro - SPIEG... - 0 views

  • No, of course not. Today, we live in a currency zone that, despite everything, is significantly more stable than where the dollar or yen are used. The euro has brought growth and prosperity to Europe.
  • Actually, the euro was a mistake with particularly serious consequences. A monetary union requires its members to pursue the same policies and be similarly productive. The so-called convergence criteria were meant to ensure that this would happen. But -- as the dramatic developments in Greece are now showing -- they didn't.
  • Unfortunately, our fears have become a reality. The monetary union was launched with real self-deception.
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  • The euro was sold to us as a modernization program for Europe, and we were also told that it would push the Community toward stability. But, in reality, it has drifted apart and become a truly unstable entity.
  • The euro was sold to us as a modernization program for Europe, and we were also told that it would push the Community toward stability. But, in reality, it has drifted apart and become a truly unstable entity.
  • There is no reason why the euro should be coming under pressure. The decision to introduce it was smart and far-sighted.
  • thanks to the common currency, it's no longer possible, for example, to wage speculative attacks on individual currencies. This eliminates a key disruptive factor that massively destabilized markets in the past.
  • Still, thanks to the common currency, it's no longer possible, for example, to wage speculative attacks on individual currencies. This eliminates a key disruptive factor that massively destabilized markets in the past.
  • Today, there are two blocs within the monetary union: a strong currency bloc in the north and a weak one in the south.
  • Starbatty: But that's exactly the problem! In the past, exchange rates served as a valve. Individual countries could control their economies by allowing their currencies to gain or lose value.
  • But that's exactly the problem! In the past, exchange rates served as a valve.
  • SPIEGEL: What would happen if the old currencies were reintroduced in the euro zone tomorrow? Bofinger: It would be a catastrophe. The German mark would have to appreciate significantly -- I'd say by 10 percent to 20 percent. Everything that we've worked so hard to attain in terms of competitiveness would vanish overnight.
  • What would happen if the old currencies were reintroduced in the euro zone tomorrow? Bofinger: It would be a catastrophe. The German mark would have to appreciate significantly -- I'd say by 10 percent to 20 percent. Everything that we've worked so hard to attain in terms of competitiveness would vanish overnight.
  • SPIEGEL: Would it have been better if all countries in Europe had kept their own currencies? Starbatty: Yes. A community can't function when it's made up of unequal partners who are supposed to behave as equals. With the euro, Germany has created an artificial competitive advantage for itself, which has enabled us to conquer markets all over the world.
  • Starbatty: Yes. A community can't function when it's made up of unequal partners who are supposed to behave as equals. With the euro, Germany has created an artificial competitive advantage for itself, which has enabled us to conquer markets all over the world.
  • Since 1995, there have been almost no appreciable wage increases in Germany, partly as a result of pressure brought on from increases in subcontracted labor. Politicians have done everything to relieve employers of the burden of paying social security contributions because we fell into this strange panic, believing we weren't globally competitive. With our economic policies, we placed too much of a lopsided emphasis on exports.
  • Politicians have done everything to relieve employers of the burden of paying social security contributions because we fell into this strange panic, believing we weren't globally competitive.
Gene Ellis

PIMCO | - ​​TARGET2: A Channel for Europe's Capital Flight - 0 views

  • Its full name is more than a mouthful. Trans-European Automated Real-time Gross Settlement System is better known as TARGET2 for short. It is the behind-the-scene payments system that conveniently enables citizens across the euro area to settle electronic transactions in euro. And at just over €500 billion, its TARGET2 claim on the Eurosystem is also the largest and fastest growing item on the Bundesbank’s balance sheet, as well as a source of much misunderstanding and debate.
  • The allocation of TARGET2 balances among the seventeen national central banks, which together with the ECB make up the Eurosystem, reflects where the market allocates the money created by the ECB. The fact that the Bundesbank has a large TARGET2 claim (asset) on the Eurosystem, while national central banks in southern Europe and Ireland together have an equally large TARGET2 liability, simply reflects that a lot of the ECB’s newly created money has ended up in Germany. Why? Because of capital flight.
  • Since the euro eliminated exchange rate risk among its member states, Germany has invested a substantial portion of its savings in Europe’s current account deficit countries. Some of those savings are now returning home. That’s the capital flight.
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  • The ECB stepped into the void left by foreign investors pulling their savings out of these current account deficit countries by lending their banks more money.
  • When large capital flight to Germany occurred before the euro’s introduction, the deutschemark would appreciate against other European currencies. While pegged against the deutschemark, these exchange rates were still flexible. That flexibility disappeared with the euro. When capital flight occurs today, the Bundesbank effectively ends up with loans to the other national central banks that are reflected in the TARGET2 claims on the Eurosystem. 
  • Debt overhangs persist, growth is mediocre and the governance structure – a common monetary policy without a centralized fiscal policy – is a challenge.
  • The ECB has allowed banks to borrow as much money as they want for up to three years. Indeed, at the end of February banks were borrowing €1.2 trillion from the ECB, twelve times the amount of their required reserves. With so much excess liquidity in the money markets, further capital flight is likely to cause a disproportionable share of this money to end up in Germany
  • Concerned about the stability of the euro, Germany’s savers are shifting their money into real estate. German residential house prices and rents rose by 4.7% last year, the fastest increase since 1993’s reunification boom. So far, Germans are not leveraging to buy houses. Growth in German mortgages is paltry at just 1.2% per annum according to the ECB as of December 2011, but in our view all ingredients for a debt-financed house price boom are there. Distrust in the euro is rising,
  • The ECB’s generous monetary policy will delay the internal devaluation adjustment of the eurozone’s current account deficit countries.
  • Mexico’s current account deficit fell by 5.3% of GDP in 1995, according to Haver Analytics, in the wake of capital flight following the government’s decision to float the peso in 1994, while its recession lasted only one year.
Gene Ellis

Op-ed: Greece's Exit May Become the Euro's Envy - 0 views

  • The immediate consequences of Greece leaving or being forced out of the euro area would certainly be devastating. Capital flight would intensify, fuelling depreciation and inflation. All existing contracts would need to be redenominated and renegotiated, creating financial chaos. Perhaps most politically devastating, fiscal austerity might actually need to intensify, since Greece still runs a primary deficit, which it would have to correct if EU and International Monetary Fund financing vanished.
  • But this process would also produce a substantially depreciated exchange rate (50 drachmas to the euro, anyone?) And that would set in motion a process of adjustment that would soon reorient the economy and put it on a path of sustainable growth. In fact, Greek growth would probably surge, possibly for a prolonged period, if it adopted sensible policies to rapidly restore and sustain macroeconomic stability.
  • Just look at what happened to the countries that defaulted and devalued during the financial crises of the 1990s. They all initially suffered severe contractions. But the recessions lasted only one or two years. Then came the rebound. South Korea posted nine years of growth averaging nearly 6 percent. Indonesia, which experienced a wave of defaults that toppled nearly every bank in the entire system, registered growth above 5 percent for a similar period; Argentina close to 8 percent; and Russia above 7 percent. The historical record shows clearly that there is life after financial crises.
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  • Today, Germany grudgingly does the minimum needed to keep the euro area intact. If exit to emulate Greece becomes an attractive proposition, Germany will be put on the spot—and the magnanimity it shows in place of its current miserliness will be the ultimate test of how much it values the euro area.
  • The answer might prove surprising. The German public might suddenly realize that the euro area confers on Germany not one but two “exorbitant privileges”: low interest rates as the haven for European capital and a competitive exchange rate by being hitched to weaker partners. In that case, Germany would have to offer its partners a much more attractive deal to keep them in the euro area.
Gene Ellis

TARGET2 as a scapegoat for German errors | vox - 0 views

  • This coincided with the bubble years in peripheral Eurozone countries (2003-07). The effect of this is that Germany accumulated large net claims on Eurozone countries, which at the end of 2011 amounted to €634 billion.
  • These current account surpluses did not lead to TARGET2 claims during the bubble years because the counterpart of these surpluses were increasing claims held by (mainly) German banks against the other Eurozone countries.
  • the German banking system was lending the money to other Eurozone countries to allow them to buy surplus German products – a highly risky affair.
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  • This created the illusion that no risk was involved; in fact the risks were increasing every year.
  • It should have been obvious that the debtor countries could get into payment difficulties as they were piling up debt made possible by the loans of German banks.
  • If there is a breakup of the Eurozone, Germany will face the risk that some debtor countries default on their debt. But again this risk is not affected by the size of the TARGET2 claims of Germany.
  • The risk that Germany faces as a result of its net exposure to other Eurozone countries is therefore entirely of the country’s own making.
  • Since 2009, when the TARGET2 balances started to take off, current account deficits of the peripheral countries as a whole declined from 9.1% of their GDP to 4.5%. These declines were mainly due to deep recessions in these countries.
  • Sinn (2012) argues that these deficits would have had to decline even faster had there been no financing through the TARGET2 mechanism. This is certainly true. But this is the same as saying that these countries should have pushed their economies into even deeper recessions.
  • The main reason why German TARGET2 claims have increased so much since 2010 is capital flows. The flows have taken two forms.
  • The first one came about when German banks unloaded their loans made to peripheral countries into the balance sheet of the Bundesbank.
  • The second one was the result of non-residents shifting their deposits from their local banks into the German banking system out of fear of a breakup of the Eurozone.
  • This led German banks to stop their credit lines to southern banks (and other northern EZ banks followed)
  • Thus in the scenario of a breakup, with or without TARGET2 claims, the risk of large losses for the German taxpayer is very similar.
  • the Bundesbank can eliminate the risk of such last minute accumulations of TARGET2 balances by converting euros into new German marks only for German residents.
Gene Ellis

Syriza and the French indemnity of 1871-73 | Michael Pettis' CHINA FINANCIAL MARKETS - 0 views

  • Fundamental to the argument that Spain (or Greece, or anyone else) has a moral obligation to repay in full its debt to Germany are two assumptions. The first assumption is that “Spain” borrowed the money from “Germany”, and that there is a collective obligation on the part of Spain to repay the German collective. The second assumption is that Spain had a choice in what it could do with the German money that poured into the country, and so it must be held responsible for its having mis-used hard-earned german funds.
  • There was plenty of irresponsible behavior in every country, and it is absurd to think that if German and Spanish banks were pouring nearly unlimited amounts of money into countries at extremely low or even negative real interest rates, especially once these initial inflows had set off stock market and real estate booms, that there was any chance that these countries would not respond in the way every country in history, including Germany in the 1870s and in the 1920s, had responded under similar conditions.
  • The winners have been banks, owners of assets, and business owners, mainly in Germany, whose profits were much higher during the last decade than they could possibly have been otherwise
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  •  Second, it is the responsibility of the leading centrist parties to recognize the options explicitly. If they do not, extremist parties either of the right or the left will take control of the debate, and convert what is a conflict between different economic sectors into a nationalist conflict or a class conflict. If the former win, it will spell the end of the grand European experiment.
  • First, as long as Spain suffers from its current debt burden, it does not matter how intelligently and forcefully it implements economic reforms. It will not be able to grow out of its debt burden and must choose between two paths
  • Most currency and sovereign debt crises in modern history ultimately represent a conflict over how the costs are to be assigned among two different groups
  •  
    Highly recommended!
Gene Ellis

Ukraine crisis: Russian retaliation could hit Western mulitinationals - 0 views

shared by Gene Ellis on 05 Feb 15 - No Cached
  • "There no doubt would be Russian retaliation," said Justin Logan, director of foreign policy studies at the Cato Institute. "Companies with money tied up in Russia would have a tough time getting it back out."
  • The White House said Friday that President Barack Obama and the leaders of Germany, the United Kingdom, France and Italy agreed after a conference call that they're ready to inflict targeted sanctions against Russia if Moscow es
  • The lion's share of foreign money in Russia is from major energy sector players like Shell, Exxon, and BP, said Fadel Gheit, senior energy analyst at Oppenheimer
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  • Shell is working with Gazprom on natural gas extraction in Russia; Exxon has a multibillion dollar exploration partnership with Rosneft, a major oil producer controlled by the Russian government, and BP owns nearly 20 percent of Rosneft.
  • "Shell and Exxon have physical assets in Russia," said Gheit. "But pound-for-pound, BP has the biggest exposure in Russia." Although BP may have the most to lose from an economic tug-of-war between Moscow and the West, tough lessons that BP learned in Russia—through a defunct partnership with Rosneft called TNK-BP—also make BP best equipped for any future fallout, said Nicholas Spiro, managing director of Spiro Sovereign Strategy.
  • Spiro said that several German firms have also steeled themselves for possible fallout from friction between the Russia and the West. "German companies are huge here," said Spiro, naming BASF, energy firm RWE, and Siemens as companies with operations in Russia. BASF is working to finalize a deal with Gazprom that would give it a stake in Siberian oil fields; RWE has reached a preliminary deal to sell its natural gas subsidiary to Russian billionaires Mikhail Fridman and German Khan, and Siemens has a partnership with state-run railroad monopoly Russian Railways. Late last month, Siemens CEO Joe Kaeser made a trip to Moscow to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin at his residence and voice support for a "trusting relationship" with Russian companies.
  • We know that if the West's resolve starts to crumble, it will almost certainly start in Germany,
  • "That's the canary in the coal mine."
  • "It starts with Germany and works its way down," said Hogan. "They have the most trade back-and-forth, and Germany gets the highest percentage of its energy from Russia."
  • Alcoa owns aluminum fabrication facilities in Russia, and Boeing has a design center in Moscow, as well as a joint venture with VSMPO-Avisma, the world's largest titanium producer.
  • Members of the Russian parliament have also proposed charging international payments companies like Visa and Mastercard with pre-emptive "security fees," with the stated aim of preparing for future financial disruptions.
Gene Ellis

Shifting energy trends blunt Russia's natural-gas weapon - The Washington Post - 0 views

  • As clunky Soviet-era factories and mines have become more efficient or gone out of business, Ukraine’s domestic gas consumption has dropped nearly 40 percent over the past five years, cutting its imports from Russia in half, according to a report by Sberbank Investment Research.
  • Domestic consumption might drop further if Ukraine trims the generous subsidies it gives households using natural gas, although so few households are paying their bills that it might not matter. “People will go from not paying the lower price to not paying the higher price,” said Thane Gustafson, senior director of Russian energy for the consulting firm IHS CERA.
  • Even if residential customers paid up, the Ukrainian state energy company, Naftogaz, would lose money on those sales
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  • “An inefficient and opaque energy sector continues to weigh heavily on public finances and the economy,” the International Monetary Fund said, noting that energy subsidies reached 7.5 percent of Ukraine’s GDP in 2012. “The very low tariffs for residential gas and district heating cover only a fraction of economic costs and encourage one of the highest energy consumption levels in Europe,” the IMF said in December.
  • Now, the upheaval of the past two weeks has thrown Ukraine’s gas strategy into greater confusion. “There is no government and there are no agencies to do business with,” said Simon Pirani, senior research fellow at the Oxford Institute for Energy Studies. “How high up the list of priorities it is is anyone’s guess.”
  • Even if the deals with foreign companies advance, Ukraine will need to import about half of its gas needs,
  • In 2012, many European industrial users and power plants switched to coal, and Russia agreed to renegotiate.
  • The link between gas and oil prices has been severed for about half of Russia’s gas sales.
  • Gazprom also agreed to eliminate contract clauses that said a country such as Germany could reship Russian gas only with Gazprom’s approval.
  • As a result, Ukraine ended up paying more than Gazprom’s customers in Germany, and last year Ukraine imported small quantities of natural gas from Germany and Hungary through pipelines in Slovakia and Poland, experts say. Germany buys gas from a variety of countries, but rerouted Russian gas has effectively been undercutting other Russian gas.
Gene Ellis

The Eurozone's Delayed Reckoning by Nouriel Roubini - Project Syndicate - 0 views

  • For starters, the European Central Bank’s “outright monetary transactions” program has been incredibly effective: interest-rate spreads for Spain and Italy have fallen by about 250 basis points, even before a single euro has been spent to purchase government bonds.
  • The introduction of the European Stability Mechanism (ESM), which provides another €500 billion ($650 billion) to be used to backstop banks and sovereigns, has also helped, as has European leaders’ recognition that a monetary union alone is unstable and incomplete, requiring deeper banking, fiscal, economic, and political integration.
  • But, perhaps most important, Germany’s attitude toward the eurozone in general, and Greece in particular, has changed. German officials now understand that, given extensive trade and financial links, a disorderly eurozone hurts not just the periphery but the core.
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  • GDP continues to shrink,
  • Moreover, balkanization of economic activity, banking systems, and public-debt markets continues, as foreign investors flee the eurozone periphery and seek safety in the core.
  • Likewise, competitiveness losses have been partly reversed as wages have lagged productivity growth, thus reducing unit labor costs, and some structural reforms are ongoing.
    • Gene Ellis
       
      This, indeed, is the crux of the matter.
  • either the eurozone moves toward fuller integration (capped by political union to provide democratic legitimacy to the loss of national sovereignty on banking, fiscal, and economic affairs), or it will undergo disunion, dis-integration, fragmentation, and eventual breakup.
  • but countries like Germany, which were over-saving and running external surpluses, have not been forced to adjust by increasing domestic demand, so their trade surpluses have remained large.
  • German leaders fear that the risk-sharing elements of deeper integration
  • imply a politically unacceptable transfer union whereby Germany and the core unilaterally and permanently subsidize the periphery.
  • Of course, Germany fails to recognize that successful monetary unions like the United States have a full banking union with significant risk-sharing elements, and a fiscal union whereby idiosyncratic shocks to specific states’ output are absorbed by the federal budget. The US is also a large transfer union, in which richer states permanently subsidize the poorer ones.
    • Gene Ellis
       
      These are key features, built into the over-representation of the poorer, smaller, more agricultural, states; as well as in the central institutions.
  • But the fundamental crisis of the eurozone has not been resolved, and another year of muddling through could revive these risks in a more virulent form in 2014 and beyond. Unfortunately, the eurozone crisis is likely to remain with us for years to come, sustaining the likelihood of coercive debt restructurings and eurozone exits.
  •  
    Late 2012 reading
Gene Ellis

Europe in Depression? by Federico Fubini - Project Syndicate - 0 views

  • For Italy, Europe’s fourth-largest economy, the current slump is proving to be deeper than the one 80 years ago. Meanwhile, huge savings and potential demand for consumer and capital goods remain locked up next door.
  • The second exception is France. Over the last year, France’s external deficit deteriorated further, from a 2.4% to 3.5% of GDP. France now faces zero or negative growth in 2013, and seems to have reached the point at which it must reverse course on competitiveness or risk more trouble ahead.
  • How did this happen? As Kemal Derviş has pointed out, the cumulated current-account surplus of the Scandinavian countries, the Netherlands, Austria, Switzerland, and Germany is now around $500 billion. This dwarfs China’s surplus at its mercantilist peak of the mid-2000’s, when the G-7 (including Germany) regularly scolded the Chinese for fueling global imbalances.
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  • For example, in November 2011, interest rates on Italian sovereign bonds were around 8% all along the curve, even as the government faced refinancing needs totaling nearly 30% of GDP over the following year. Because debt monetization was not an option, austerity had to ensue at that point, regardless of what Merkel – or anyone else – had to say.
  • Southern countries, still largely in denial, should accept the need for deeper, competiveness-enhancing reforms. Germany and its allies, for their part, should accept that running high external surpluses is damaging the eurozone and themselves, and that it is time for them to put part of their huge excess savings to work to support growth.
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