Of all a firm's inputs, its workers' effort is perhaps the oddest http://t.co/9NJXTK3rns
14 minutes ago
United States Channel: Latest Posts
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Finance & Markets
Everything You Need to Know About the G20 Statement in One Word
Well, that was exciting. -
The Wilder View
G20 Summit: Low expectations fulfilled
To be sure, there have been “global recessions.” The Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development (OECD) seven major countries – Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, United Kingdom, and the United States – have jointly seen negative growth since the fourth quarter of 2007.
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Finance & Markets
The Perils of Efficiency
James Surowiecki: -
Finance & Markets
A Housing Fix with the Right Incentives
The FDIC proposal is a constructive and important plan to encourage reworked mortgages while attempting to limit taxpayer exposure, but it does appear to have a few drawbacks.
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Finance & Markets
GE Capital is a bank, but Genworth will be too
A reader has recently corrected a claim I made on a recent blog entry regarding GE Capital. I would like to bring this error to your attention and make a few comments.
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Finance & Markets
Acronyms
Markets remain edgy today, with SPX futures current trading down 2% from Monday’s limp close. Last week’s 11% intraday rally seems like a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away.
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Finance & Markets
Volcker warns how serious things have become
In a very downbeat assessment of the ability of financial and monetary stewards to deal with the most protracted financial crisis is some 75 years, Paul Volcker, the esteemed former Fed Chariman warned that the economic slump has spread in a way that greatly challenges the Obama administration’s ability to restore order.
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Finance & Markets
Paulson: Fighting the Financial Crisis
Hank Paulson pats himself on the back: -
Finance & Markets
New Hope for Financial Economics: Interview with Bill Janeway
“NOTHING the Government does will work until they get rid of these nightmares. Letting credit default swaps (“CDS”) redefine insolvency as failure to post collateral means systemically critical counterparties such as Lehman Brothers or Bear are certain to fail once they wobble and, even worse, that there will be NOTHING LEFT for traditional creditors (including commercial paper) when they do. This has seized up the money markets, which no longer function without government assistance. This means the Government picks winners and losers, encourages investors NOT to underwrite and incents those “chosen” to sit on the money they can raise and keep credit velocity at zero. As long as CDS exist in bilateral form there is structural uncertainty in what it means to have a balance sheet. For everybody. CDS should be DOA.”
A reader of The IRA
“Political economy is not a science, it’s a clinical art, like medicine.” Eliot Janeway
As this issue of The IRA goes to press, we hear that the Obama camp is considering our friend and former Fed Chairman Paul Volcker as Treasury Secretary. The idea is to have Volcker lead the toxic waste cleanup for a year, so it is suggested, to be followed by New York Fed chief Tim Geithner.
Our advice to Chairman Volcker is to turn down this dubious honor. Paul Volcker has enormous credibility and judgment, but he does not have enough experience with and understanding of these financial markets to be effective, at least in our view.
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Finance & Markets
My Bet: Larry Summers will be Chosen Treasury Secretary
Everyone speculating on President-Elect Obama’s most likely choice for Secretary of the Treasury has the same two names: Larry Summers and Tim Geithner. I have known them for a long time, and worked with both in the Clinton Administration. Either one would be excellent. Geithner is now way ahead in the Intrade odds: 45% to 27% as of November 14. But my bet is that Obama will go with Summers. For one thing, Geithner is needed at the New York Fed, where he has been one of the key players managing the financial crisis.
