This will be my last blog post, at least for the foreseeable future. I have accepted a new job , one that will require a certain level of discretion. I am excited by its challenges: ‘Balanced and sustainable” growth is something that I believe in. But suspending this blog…
Check out the following reports from Nouriel’s speech at a mining conference in Kalgoorlie, Australia: Telegraph – Nouriel Roubini Warns China Could Cause Commodity Price Slide Purchasing – Economist Says Price Hikes Likely in 2010 for Metals, Other Raw Materials Bloomberg – Roubini Says Commodity Prices May Rise in…
One of the biggest economic and political stories of this decade has been China’s emergence as the world’s biggest creditor country. At least in a ‘flow” sense. China’s current account surplus is now the world’s largest – and its government easily tops a “reserve and sovereign wealth fund” growth…
Qing Wang of Morgan Stanley: “Given China’s high national savings rate, from the perspective of the economy as a whole, there are only three forms in which China can deploy its savings: 1) onshore physical assets; 2) offshore physical assets; and 3) offshore financial assets. …. We therefore think…
Coinciding with this week’s release of RGE Monitor’s updated 2009/10 Global Economic Outlook, here we present an overview of our European Economic Outlook, including the Nordics, the Baltics and Central and Eastern Europe. Previous newsletters addressed RGE’s U.S. outlook , the outlook for China , and Japan . The…
Is now rather obvious. The dollar goes down as well as up. Last fall, demand for dollars rose — in part because Americans pulled funds out of the rest of the world faster than foreigners pulled funds out of the US. The dollar soared.
Read more here – The…
China’s latest surge in reserves – a surge that look its total holdings over two trillion dollars – didn’t really register in the financial media. China’s first trillion was a big story. The second trillion, not so much. It generated a few news stories and blog posts , but…
One of the questions raised by the expansion of sovereign wealth funds – back when sovereign funds were growing rapidly on the back of high oil prices and Asian countries’ increased willingness to take risks with the reserves – was whether sovereign funds should best be understood as a…
The goods news: the US trade deficit has shrunk. On a rolling 12m basis the trade deficit is down to around $500 billion, and the data from the last few months suggests that it should fall even further. The bad news: the US trade deficit hasn’t shrunk by as…
Most reporting on the May trade data tried to fit it into the “green shoots” meta-narrative, thanks to the small uptick in exports. Never mind that total exports were about equal to their level in March even after the May uptick– and that about half the uptick between May…