The debate over the continued existence of the Euro has moved from a whacky fringe view to one, while still more unlikely than not, needs serious consideration. What is clear is that Greece is struggling through the inability to devalue their currency and complication with defaulting while remaining part of the Euro. The Germans are…
Krugman catches up with me on Bitcoins and comes to pretty much the same conclusions in fewer words. Hey, he’s been blogging and writing and talking about economics longer than I have so that’s ok. I haven’t seen the data myself, but he points to declining value of transacations as people hoard Bitcoins – exactly…
I don’t think many serious investors care that S&P downgraded US debt. Bond yields are down (more on this in my next post), which means prices are up. US stocks are down, but that’s more about concerns about US and global economic prospects than the credit of the US government. Nevertheless, S&P did downgrade. Why?…
The US probably won’t go into recession again in the next two years. And by that I mean it’s more likely that they won’t than that they will. Â Larry Summers and Goldman Sachs both now estimate a one-in-three chance of a double-dip recession. But as I mentioned before, the definition of “recession” isn’t as important…
It’s easy to get yourself into a corner if you make decisions without a sound basis. More than that, it’s really hard to change your mind if there was never a basis for the decision in the first base. Or if you don’t want to be honest about what the basis is. What am I…
S&P has downgraded the US from AAA to AA+. Is this economics? Is this politics? Is this accurate? All good questions. Does it matter? Not really. There may be some technical problems associated with the definition of “risk free” particularly when it comes to discounting cash flows at at “risk free curve”. The problem South…
So Swaziland is in a whole heap of economic and political trouble; South Africa’s loan isn’t going to change any of that in the long run. The way the global economy looks at the moment, there’s no particular reason to think that the SA economy is going to be anything better than stagnant over the…
Swaziland vs Greece? More like Swaziland and Greece: Linked to a currency they can’t control Potentially devastating consequences if they devalue their currency and move away from the peg Fiscal irresponsibility A small country relative to their economic neighbors Except Swaziland has a dictator in charge and gets a bail-out without serious conditions and at…
