BONOBO LAND

• The Dollar As A Funding Currency

  Nouriel Robini is not a man who is known for mincing his words. “We have the mother of all carry trades,” he tells us, “Everybody’s playing the same game and this game is becoming dangerous.” There is a “wall of liquidity” sweeping the planet, pushing asset prices ever higher in [...]
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  Posted: November 05, 2009, 6:13pm EST
  

• Norwegian Wood

  Well, if John Lennon had still been around today he would undoubtedly have entitled his song Norwegian oil, but whatever way you want to put it Norway is back in the news, and this time not because of adolescents who find themselves with no alternative to sleeping overnight in the [...]
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  Posted: November 03, 2009, 5:21pm EST
  

• A New Spectre Is Haunting Europe, A Spanish One

  A spectre is haunting Europe, but this time it is not the spectre of revolt by the popular masses, or even one of yet another wave of bank bailouts. No, the spectre which is currently stalking the corridors of Europe's most prestigous institutions is one of a Spanish economy which [...]
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  Posted: November 03, 2009, 9:18am EST
  

• What Exactly Is Going On In Finland?

  Finland, we have recently been told, is the world's most prosperous nation, and it is deemed to be prosperous not only in monetary and financial terms, but also in terms of the implicit wealth of its democracy and governance. This striking assessment is to be found in the latest edition [...]
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  Posted: October 29, 2009, 7:07pm EDT
  

• There Is Another Shoe To Drop In The Global Economic and Financial Crisis - And The Focus Will Be On Europe's Perifery

  'As far as I am concerned, this is ... the most complex crisis we've ever seen due to the number of factors in play'Spanish Economy Minister Pedro Solbes speaking to the Spanish radio station Punto Radio September 2008“‘The global imbalances have to add up to zero and so, if the' [...]
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  Posted: September 11, 2009, 1:59pm EDT
  

• From Original Sin To The Eternal Triangle - Lessons From Central Europe

  The non-biblical concept of original sin, as Claus Vistesen notes in this post, when propounded in its standard Obstfeld & Krugman textbook version refers to the situation where many developing economies who are not able to borrow in their own currencies feel forced to denominate large parts of their sovereign [...]
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  Posted: August 14, 2009, 5:02am EDT
  

• "Advances in Development Reverse Fertility Declines" - Science or Hocus Pocus?

  According to a once-upon-a-time post on the Economist's Certain Ideas of Europe Blog Edward Hugh “was very cross” about some of the journalism they were serving up over at that prestigious journal. Well, not to worry, since this time he is hopping mad. And the issue which lies behind his [...]
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  Posted: August 09, 2009, 4:29am EDT
  

• To The Finland Station And Back Again

  This post accompanies my recent piece on Sweden. I have been scratching my head and trying to see what could be learnt from making a comparison between Finland and Sweden. Some of the differences are obvious - one is in the euro, and the other isn't, once can adjust monetary' [...]
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  Posted: July 14, 2009, 3:36pm EDT
  

• Sweden's Economy At A Glance

  Basically this post accompanies the Swedish monetary policy and devaluation post I have recently put up on the Global Economy Matters Blog. But first some theoretical structure from Claus Vistesen.As we can see above, the idea is that as median population age rises the current account dynamics of a country [...]
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  Posted: July 14, 2009, 3:34pm EDT
  

• Cliff Hanging In Bulgaria

  The International Monetary Fund this week forecast the recession in Bulgaria would be deeper than it previously predicted. Such a decision should come as no surprise to anyone, since the country's economic dynamics in both the short and long term look extremely unstable, and Bulgaria is now almost certainly headed [...]
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  Posted: July 13, 2009, 7:25am EDT
  

• Facebook Links

  Quietly clicking my way through Bloomberg last Sunday afternoon, I came across this:Facebook Members Register Names at 550 a SecondFacebook Inc., the world’s largest social-networking site, said members registered new user names at a rate of more than 550 a second after the company offered people the chance to claim [...]
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  Posted: June 20, 2009, 5:49am EDT
  

• David Takes On Goliath and Loses: The Ferguson - Krugman Exchange

  "As long as excessive debt is not digested, both monetary and fiscal policies are inefficient. There is not much of an alternative. Either to let the economy collapse, in order to reduce debts, and then use fiscal policy to revive it, or inundate the insolvent economy with public credit, to" [...]
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  Posted: June 10, 2009, 2:38am EDT
  

• Latvia - Devalue Now or Devalue Later?

  The Latvian economy is certaily stuck in a hard and not especially pleasent place at the moment, and really one chart tells it all, since as we see above the local interbank overnight interest rates have been storming upwards and through the roof over the last two weeks. As a [...]
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  Posted: June 07, 2009, 10:31am EDT
  

• Seeing is Believing, But Stabilising is NOT Recovering

  This is one of the key points I have been hammering here on this blog for some weeks now. There is clear evidence of most economies globally "stabilising" at this point, you could even stretch it to say that the "worst is over" - since I doubt we will go [...]
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  Posted: May 28, 2009, 7:15am EDT
  

• Don't Get Carried Away Now!

  As Paul Krugman recently pointed out, one of the central points they made in the latest IMF World Economic Outlook was that recessions caused by financial crises tend to get resolved on the back of export-lead booms, with countries normally emerging from the crisis with a positive trade balance of [...]
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  Posted: May 23, 2009, 5:49am EDT
  

• Is Hungary Set To Become The New Iceland?

  Iceland, why on earth Iceland? Well, the issue I have in mind concerns the independence and viability of central bank monetary policy (especially in a small open economy like Hungary's) and the role interest rates, and investor sentiment, and yield differentials, and oh yes, I almost forgot, that notorious vehicle' [...]
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  Posted: May 20, 2009, 6:04am EDT
  

• Is The Indian Economy Heading For Its Finest Hour?

  "For what it’s worth, a key conclusion from the IMF’s new World Economic Outlook is that recessions caused by financial crisis typically end with export booms, with the trade balance improving,on average, by more than 3 percent of GDP. I find this a disturbing result: we’re now suffering from a" [...]
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  Posted: May 18, 2009, 6:06am EDT
  

• The ECB "Buys Into" Spanish Property

  “The 60 billion euros they announced is peanuts for an economy the size of the euro zone,” economics professor and former Bank of England policy maker Willem Buiter said at a conference in Dublin yesterday. “I expect they will announce more or that the recession in the euro zone will [...]
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  Posted: May 14, 2009, 6:07am EDT
  

• The Almunia Syllogism

  European Monetary Affairs Commissioner Joaquín Almunia recently, and possibly totally inadvertently, stumbled on a very interesting argument. Here it is:"Who is crazy enough to leave the euro area? Nobody," Almunia said. "The number of candidates to join the euro area increases. The number of candidates to leave the euro area" [...]
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  Posted: March 22, 2009, 5:51am EDT
  

• "There Is No Deflation Threat In Europe" - Jean Claude Trichet - Oh Really!

  He's at it again. Last year he was busily trying to worry us all that inflation was set to get completely out of hand among the 16 countries who make up the eurozone. Now the President of the European Central Bank, Jean-Claude Trichet, is hard at it on another tack [...]
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  Posted: March 02, 2009, 7:52am EST
  

• Let The East Into The Eurozone Now!

  “It’s 20 years after Europe was united in 1989 – what a tragedy if you allow Europe to split again.”Robert Zoellick, World Bank president, in an interview with the Financial Times(Click On Image To View Video)World Bank president, Robert Zoellick, made a call this week - in an interview with [...]
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  Posted: February 22, 2009, 3:17pm EST
  

• The EU Bonds Story Rumbles On

  Wolfgan Munchau was complaining only last weekend about the extraordinary narrow-mindedness of Europe's economic and political leadership in the face of the current financial and economic crisis, from Ireland in the West to Hungary in the East, and from Greece in the South to Sweden in the North. But more [...]
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  Posted: February 18, 2009, 5:40pm EST
  

• Russian Debt And The Euro

  Keynes’s genius – a very English one – was to insist we should approach an economic system not as a morality play but as a technical challenge.Martin Wolf, Financial TimesThe euro fell again yesterday, by 1.1 percent against the dollar (to $1.2860) and by 1.2 percent against the yen (to [...]
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  Posted: February 10, 2009, 4:44am EST
  

• Italy Needs EU Bonds And It Needs Them Now!

  You see, this isn’t a brainstorming session — it’s a collision of fundamentally incompatible world views.Paul KrugmanAs a wise man recently said, failure to act effectively risks turning this slump into a catastrophe. Yet there’s a sense, watching the process so far, of low energy. What’s going on?Paul KrugmanFirst, focus [...]
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  Posted: February 07, 2009, 7:27am EST
  

• The Ruble Fall Continues As Unemployment Soars

  Russia's current woes can be readily summed up in just one single variable - the value of the ruble - and this value, as we all know, is falling. Almost uncontrollably so.The bank’s target will be “very quickly” breached without more intervention, said Gaelle Blanchard of Societe Generale SA in' [...]
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  Posted: February 01, 2009, 10:01am EST
  

• How Near Is The Czech Economy To Recession?

  The highly open Czech economy is set to slow down considerably, affected by the deteriorating outlook for its main trading partners. Although GDP growth was still solid in Q3 2008, both exports and imports growth slowed significantly. The global crisis is expected to adversely impact the real economy particularly from [...]
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  Posted: January 25, 2009, 4:18am EST
  

• The Long And Difficult Road To Wage Cuts As An Alternative To Devaluation

  Well it's pretty clear to me at least that there is now one, and only one, major and outsanding topic towering head and shoulders above all those other pressing and important problems those of us following the EU economies currently find lying in our macro-policy in-trays: the issue of wage [...]
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  Posted: January 19, 2009, 11:02am EST
  

• Germany IS About To Have Its Worst Recession Since WWII

  The German economy is about to suffer its deepest recession since World War II according to economics Minister Michael Glos speaking in an interview with the German newspaper Welt am Sonntag due to be published tomorrow (Sunday). Glos said growth in Europe's largest economy is now expected to drop by [...]
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  Posted: January 19, 2009, 2:00am EST
  

• Why VTB Bank's Russia GDP Indicator Is So Useful

  This post is partly about Russia, partly about how to follow the present economic crisis on a day to day basis and partly methodological.So Which Are The Worst Affected Countries In The Present Crisis?Obviously the simple answer to this question is "all of them", and in particular all those countries [...]
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  Posted: January 18, 2009, 3:28pm EST
  

• Why Spain's Economic Crisis Is Something More Than A "Housing Slump"

  Spain's inflation (as measured by the EU HICP methodology) was around 1.5% (year on year) in December 2008, according to the flash estimate issued by the stats office (INE) earlier this week. This number only offers us an initial glimpse of the final HICP reading, but, if confirmed, it will' [...]
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  Posted: January 07, 2009, 9:32am EST
  

• The Second Great Depression Wends Its Way Forward in December

  And lands in China. Well China isn't quite in Great Depression mode yet, but manufacturing activity - which forms the core of the Chinese economy and accounts for 43% of all activity - is already very close to a technical recession, and phew, it wasn't very long ago that the [...]
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  Posted: January 02, 2009, 10:20am EST
  

• As The Politicians Battle It Out Ukraine's Economy Tunnels South In Search Of Australia

  “In Ukraine, the evidence is still that policymakers do not quite understand the seriousness of the challenges they face,”. Timothy Ash, analyst at the Royal Bank of Scotland. “There is a burgeoning economic crisis in the European periphery,” Krugman said on the ABC network Dec. 14. “The money has dried [...]
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  Posted: December 25, 2008, 11:01am EST
  

• Did (or Didn't) Japan Just Re-introduce Quantitative Easing?

  With the US Federal Reserve now adopting what is widely regarded as some variant of quantitative easing (QE), and with the Bank of Japan cutting interest rates amidst economic conditions which BoJ Governor Masaaki Shirakawa describes as "severe", perhaps it is worth taking time out to have a looking at [...]
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  Posted: December 22, 2008, 11:04am EST
  

• Russia's Economic And Financial Meltdown Continues Apace

  Russia's foreign-exchange reserves have been now been declining very rapidly since mid August, and as the money goes so does the faith that the large stock of reserves the country built up during the boom times would be sufficient to see them through any downturn in energy prices. As the [...]
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  Posted: December 16, 2008, 5:07am EST
  

• Why We All Need To Keep An Eye On What Is Happening In Greece

  In view of Greece's EMU membership, the availability of external financing is not a concern, but the correction of cumulating indebtedness could weigh appreciably on growth going forward. While the risk of transmitting vulnerabilities to the euro area is very small reflecting Greece’s small relative size, large persistent current account' [...]
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  Posted: December 14, 2008, 8:59am EST
  

• Romania's Economy Heads Off Quietly, And With No Fanfares, Into It's Deepest Crisis in a Decade

  Controversy surrounding the Romanian economy is nothing new, nor, as Manuel points out in his post on the recent election, are Romanian politics strangers to tumult. Nonetheless the intensity of controversy has grown considerably of late, with a wide variety of assessments being offered concerning the likely impact of the [...]
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  Posted: December 07, 2008, 6:15am EST
  

• As Spanish Unemployment Rises Sharply Again, Just When Did Spain Enter Recession?

  The number of people presenting jobless claims in Spain soared to nearly 3 million in November, following a 6 percent rise in registrations over October, providing us with yet further evidence, if we needed it, of the gravity of the situation which is now unfolding before our eyes.The Spanish Labor [...]
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  Posted: December 04, 2008, 7:14am EST
  

• Are Baltic Devaluations Now In The Works?

  Now this is a very interesting question, isn't it? The only honest answer I can give is that I don't know, and indeed I haven't the faintest idea. The government of Latvia (the Baltic state which is currently most rife with "rumours" about imminent devaluations) works in its own wondrous [...]
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  Posted: November 24, 2008, 4:28am EST
  

• Repsol, Lukoil and Sacyr Vallhermosa Also Try Their Hand At Happy Families

  “Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way”TolstoyWell this is an interesting little fable of modern family life, even if all the families involved may not be ones which many of my readers would normally wish to belong to.As is now reasonably well know [...]
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  Posted: November 23, 2008, 11:22am EST
  

• The Bank Bailouts Are Very Well Intended, But Where Is All The Money Going To Come From?

  As every woman who has ever had dealings with a man knows only too well, it is a lot easier for people to make promises than it is for them to keep them. And when Europe's leaders met in Paris on the 12 October, a lot of fine promises (which [...]
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  Posted: October 29, 2008, 8:05am EDT
  

• And So It Ends - Hungary's Government Announces Foreign Currency Loan Wind-up Package

  Hungarian Prime Minister Ferenc Gyurcsány announced this morning (Wednesday) that the government had reached an agreement with commercial banks intended to protect the interests of those who have taken out foreign currency loans.The agreement, which is expected to be signed early next week, has three key components:1) At the request [...]
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  Posted: October 24, 2008, 4:26am EDT
  

• Colonialism Goes Into Reverse Gear As The Libyan Government Bails Out Unicredit

  Taking my cue from the worthy and well thumbed play-book of the Brothers Coen, I thought every now and again I might follow up all those, long, desperately serious, and highly indigestible posts about how Italy should now be considered to be "No Country For Old Men", with something in [...]
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  Posted: October 18, 2008, 6:32am EDT
  

• Hungary Is Headed For A Substantial Recession As Foreign Exchange Lending Seizes Up

  Hungary's agony continues with both currency and stock markets falling sharply yesterday while bankers continue to report acute credit shortages. At the same time contagion has started to extend its ugly reach right across eastern Europe, with Ukraine, the Baltics and Serbia (at a minimum) all in ongoing negotiations with [...]
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  Posted: October 16, 2008, 5:09pm EDT
  

• The Baltic States May Soon Follow Hungary Into IMF Receivership

  Well, the Icelandic authorities seem to have bitten the bullet, and after some coming and going agreed to accept assistance from the IMF. An IMF mission is on the island preparing a plan which will then be put to the Icelandic government (protocols here are important). Under negotiation are the [...]
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  Posted: October 14, 2008, 10:43am EDT
  

• Europe's Leaders Agree To A Common Front In Fighting The Banking Crisis

  Well, Europe's leaders have finally bitten the bullet. Faced with what IMF head Dominique Strauss Kahn warned could turn into a global financial meltdown, our leaders have risen to the challenge, at least to a certain extent. The details of what has been agreed continue to remain vague, but obviously [...]
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  Posted: October 13, 2008, 9:23am EDT
  

• The Deflation Threat Looms As Oil Turns Year on Year Negative

  Oil prices plunged below $85 a barrel on Thursday, the lowest level in a year, as Opec, the oil exporting countries’ cartel, called an emergency meeting to discuss reducing its crude production to halt the collapse in prices.This morning it is more of the same, and prices plummeted to a [...]
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  Posted: October 10, 2008, 4:14am EDT
  

• As Europe's Banks Falter, Is There A Risk To The Eurozone?

  by Edward Hugh: Barcelona“We do not have a federal budget, so the idea that we could do the same as what is done on the other side of the Atlantic doesn’t fit with the political structure of Europe,”Jean-Claude Trichet, commenting last week on the Eupean "summit" in Paris last Saturday``If [...]
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  Posted: October 06, 2008, 3:59pm EDT
  

• Happy Families Russian Style

  "Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way" Tolstoy President Dmitry Medvedev’s recent decision to inject $20 billion into Russia’s flagging stock markets – which were down nearly 50% from last May at the time - together with the $60 billion odd dollars of support injected [...]
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  Posted: September 28, 2008, 2:25pm EDT
  

• When Will Year on Year Crude Oil Turn Negative?

  When will year on year crude oil turn negative, and what will this mean for inflation? An interesting question this one. Last Friday NYMEX West Texas Intermediate Crude Oil for October delivery closed at $101.18 per barrel. Light, sweet crude for October delivery fell $5.47 to settle at $95.71 a [...]
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  Posted: September 15, 2008, 12:41pm EDT
  

• Trichet Announces New Rules For ECB Funding

  In the photo above you can see European Central Bank President Jean-Claude Trichet welcoming Irish Finance Minister Brian Lenihan to the 10th anniversary celebration of the ECB, in Frankfurt on Monday, June 02, 2008. Time To Stop The Abuse? The ECB and the Spanish banks are back in the news, following the [...]
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  Posted: September 05, 2008, 2:30pm EDT
  

• Have We Seen "Peak" Italian Retail Sales?

  Well, since Ugo Bardi recently raised the question of whether Italy had not in fact passed its own historical "peak oil" and "peak mafia" points, I thought it might be interesting to ask what else has peaked in Italy, and what better place to start than with retail sales? Sharp Drop [...]
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  Posted: September 01, 2008, 3:42am EDT
  

• German Recession Danger Rises As Consumer and Investor Confidence Falls

  German business and consumer confidence fell more than economists forecast in August, raising the likelihood that Europe's largest economy may now be steadily slipping into a recession.Business Climate Worsens In AugustThe Munich-based Ifo institute's business climate index, based on a survey of 7,000 executives, dropped to a three-year low of [...]
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  Posted: August 27, 2008, 4:15am EDT
  

• Eurozone Recession On the Horizon?

  Is the first zone wide recession in the short history of the eurozone about to be registered? Certainly the flash PMI estimates for August give the impression that it might. The Royal Bank of Scotland Group Plc's composite index came in at 48 after 47.8 reading in July. Any result [...]
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  Posted: August 21, 2008, 7:47am EDT
  

• Italy Enters Recession, But When Will It Leave?

  According to preliminary data from national statistics office ISTAT this morning Italy's GDP fell 0.3 percent in the second quarter compared with the first three months of the year and was unchanged year-on-year (ie zero percent annual growth). Final data and a detailed breakdown for the second quarter will be [...]
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  Posted: August 08, 2008, 5:55am EDT
  

• The German Economy May Have Contracted By 1% In Q2 2008

  As anticipated on this blog (and in my two posts on RGE European EconMonitor - here, and here) the German economy contracted in the second quarter, possibly by as much as 1% according to the Süddeutsche Zeitung newspaper who somehow or another seem to have gotten an advance glimpse of [...]
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  Posted: August 06, 2008, 6:28am EDT
  

• Storm Clouds Continue To Darken Over Spain

  August is going to be a long month for Spain. All those people lying on the beaches reading such depressing news day after day. We have three more gloomy inputs since last Friday.Dire Manufacturing PMI in Spain in JulySpain's manufacturing economy shrank in July at the fastest rate ever seen [...]
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  Posted: August 04, 2008, 5:58am EDT
  

• Spain's Retail Sales Down 7.9% in June, Building Permits Plummet

  Well, this is now becoming more and more of a nightmare by the day. According to the national statistics office this morning, Spain's inflation adjusted retail sales were down 9.8% year on year in June. In working day adjusted terms this represented a 7.9 percent fall, making it the largest [...]
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  Posted: July 30, 2008, 5:10am EDT
  

• What Is The Risk Of A Serious Melt-Down In The Spanish Economy?

  Economists set themselves too easy, too useless a task if in tempestuous seasons they can only tell us that when the storm is long past, the ocean is flat againJohn Maynard Keynes'As far as I am concerned, this is ... the most complex crisis we've ever seen due to the [...]
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  Posted: July 18, 2008, 10:47am EDT
  

• German Investor Confidence Drops To 16 Year Low In July

  German investor confidence fell to a record low in July as surging inflation and slowing export growth started to cloud the outlook for growth in Europe's largest economy. The ZEW Center for European Economic Research in Mannheim said its index of investor and analyst expectations dropped to minus 63.9, the [...]
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  Posted: July 15, 2008, 7:10am EDT
  

• Major Spanish Builder Suspends Trading As Consumer Confidence Plummets

  Reuters are reporting that the listed Spanish property company Martinsa Fadesa have been suspended from trading this morning following the request from the Spanish property firm last week for extra time from the banks to obtain additional credit in order to maintain its refinancing obligations. Martinsa Fadesa said on Friday [...]
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  Posted: July 14, 2008, 7:32am EDT
  

• Export Decline Offers More Evidence Of German Slowdown

  German exports declined the most in almost four years in May, as a slowdown in some key eurozone economies (Spain, Italy) and a stronger euro curbed demand. Sales abroad, adjusted for working days and seasonal changes, decreased 3.2 percent from April, the Federal Statistics Office said this morning. That's the [...]
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  Posted: July 09, 2008, 10:43am EDT
  

• Does the May Industrial Output Drop Constitute An Early Warning Signal For A Coming German Recession?

  German industrial production declined for a third consecutive month in May, offering further evidence that Europe's largest economy is slowing, and reasonably rapidly. Seasonal and inflation adjusted output was down 2.4 percent from April, when it fell 0.2 percent, according to data from the Economy Ministry in Berlin this morning. [...]
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  Posted: July 07, 2008, 12:55pm EDT
  

• German Unemployment Falls, While Employment Rises, But How Long Will It All Last?

  German unemployment declined in again in June, pushing the jobless rate to the lowest level in almost 16 years. The number of people out of work, adjusted for seasonal changes, fell 38,000 from May to 3.27 million, according to data from the Nuremberg-based Federal Labor Agency released today. The seasonally [...]
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  Posted: July 01, 2008, 9:18am EDT
  

• Has Spain Contracted The Artemio Cruz Syndrome?

  The Mexican writer Carlos Fuentes once wrote a novel entitled "The Death of Artemio Cruz". The novel begins with an elderly Artemio who suddenly finds himself awake and lying on his deathbed, gripped by repeated spasms of excruciating pain, and terrified even to open his eyes for fear of what [...]
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  Posted: June 30, 2008, 9:18am EDT
  

• Vietnam's Inflation Explosion

  The Vietnam National Statistics Office announced this week that the country's inflation rate shot up to 25.2 percent in May (when compared with same month last year). Prices increased by an estimated 3.91 percent between April and May alone, a period that saw panic shopping for rice as prices surged. [...]
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  Posted: May 28, 2008, 3:11am EDT
  

• Is Japan's Long Running Economic Expansion Finally Drawing to a Close?

  Despite the relatively healthy performance turned in by the Japanese economy in Q1 2007, the signs are that the impact of rising food and energy costs and slowing global economic growth (and hence demand for Japanese exports) are now taking their toll. ``We think April-June real GDP is at risk [...]
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  Posted: May 20, 2008, 3:40am EDT
  

• Kazakhstan's "Sudden Stop"

  The Kazakh Prosecutor General's Office said 123 construction companies that received 104 billion tenge ($865 million) in pre-payments from homebuyers are behind schedule or haven't even begun work on new apartment buildings. Assets of ``careless construction companies,'' including buildings and vehicles, have been seized to compensate lost investments of homebuyers [...]
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  Posted: May 19, 2008, 3:36am EDT
  

• Russia's Growing Inflation Headache

  Russia's inflation rate rose to an annual 14.3 percent in April, the highest since April 2003, led by rising food costs. The inflation rate rose from 13.3 percent in March, while prices rose 1.4 percent in the month, compared with 1.2 percent in March, the Moscow-based Federal Statistics Service reported [...]
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  Posted: May 05, 2008, 9:28am EDT
  

• German IFO Business Confidence April 2008

  Business confidence in Germany (as measured by the IFO index) fell back in April (reinforcing the impression given by the recent ZEW index reading) as record oil and food prices stoked inflation, weakening further already weak domestic demand, and external conditions - and hence the outlook for exports - continued [...]
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  Posted: April 24, 2008, 11:18am EDT
  

• Italian Consumer Confidence April 2008

  Italian consumer confidence rose slightly (but ever so slightly, see chart below) in April - holding near its lowest level in almost four years as an economic slowdown prompts households to cut back on spending. The Rome-based Isae Institute's index, based on a survey of 2,000 families, rose to 99.8 [...]
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  Posted: April 24, 2008, 7:28am EDT
  

• Hungary Retail Sales February 2008

  Well there are no real surprises in this months retail sales data since Hungarian retail sales dropped by 0.2% month on month in February, following a 0.1% increase January, according to data adjusted for calendar and seasonal effects from the Central Statistics Office (KSH). I say this is not surprising [...]
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  Posted: April 23, 2008, 7:06am EDT
  

• German Investor Confidence Slips

  Following Claus's excellent tour de force yesterday on the various level's of double-bind that now seem to be facing the ECB, I'd just like to chip in to the overall picture with a bit of country level detail. Investor confidence in Germany fell in April for the first time since [...]
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  Posted: April 15, 2008, 7:49am EDT
  

• Is The End Of Oil-Driven Growth in Sight in Russia?

  The FT is running the following this morning : Russian oil production has peaked and may never return to current levels, one of the country’s top energy executives has warned, fuelling concerns that the world’s biggest oil producers cannot keep up with rampant Asian demand. The warning comes as crude oil prices [...]
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  Posted: April 15, 2008, 3:51am EDT
  

• Inflation in Russia and Ukraine March 2008

  Well how all this is going to end is anyone's guess, but the probability that it will be intears seems to be growing by the month. What I am referring to is the large inflation bonfire that seems to have been lit in Russia, and the even bigger on that [...]
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  Posted: April 09, 2008, 10:56am EDT
  

• Is The German Economy Resisting?

  Germany's economy continues to show signs of bucking what in many ways could be thought of as a global slowdown trend. But just how real are the possibilities that Germany can escape from the problems that seem to be affecting many of the world's largest economies? Let's take a look [...]
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  Posted: April 02, 2008, 9:52am EDT
  

• German Exports and German Growth Resilience in January and February 2008

  Evidence is mounting that the German economy has found its second wind, and at this point in time is enduring the global downturn rather better than might have been initially expected. Perhaps the first clear indication that the progress of the German economy had stabilised came with the February reading [...]
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  Posted: March 15, 2008, 9:21am EDT
  

• Latvia's Economy Enters Recession in Q4 2007

  Well the great Baltic economy overheating debate is now gradually drawing to a close as it becomes increasingly clear in each of the three cases (Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia) which way the cookie is eventually going to crumble. Today it is Latvia's turn as we now have a more complete [...]
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  Posted: March 10, 2008, 6:00pm EDT
  

• France Retail PMI and Consumer Confidence February 2008

  Well, this week from France we have two different leading indicators - consumer confidence and retail sales - and they seem to be moving in different directions, which is rather strange to say the least. Perhaps the clearest indication that the French economy may not be holding up as well as [...]
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  Posted: March 03, 2008, 5:11am EST
  

• German Retail Sales January and PMI February

  A number of new data readings have come out from Germany during the last week, and these are leading me to some slight modification of the short term outlook I was painting in my most recent post, although my feeling is that in the mid term little has essentially changed. It [...]
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  Posted: March 03, 2008, 4:47am EST
  

• Spanish Economy Slowdown Update

  Quite a bit of Spain related data has come out over the last few days, including the latest flash estimate for CPI inflation from the INE, which came in at 4.4% for the second month running. Given that most of the Spanish economy is slowing rapidly this sort of inflation is [...]
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  Posted: March 03, 2008, 4:46am EST
  

• German GFK Consumer Confidence, The Euro and the Future of Eurozone Growth

  German market research group GfK's forward-looking consumer climate index was unchanged at 4.5 points in March 2008 from February. Since the forward index is unchanged at a rather low level this is not especially positive news. And since the constant reading is the by-product of a number of significant shifts in [...]
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  Posted: February 27, 2008, 7:45am EST
  

• February EU Commission Interim Forecast

  The European Commission released a new interim forecast for the EU economies yesterday. Of particular note was the fact that the forecast significantly reduces the growth forecasts at the same time as sharply raising its inflation estimate The Commission said it was concerned that expectations of steadily rising prices were [...]
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  Posted: February 22, 2008, 1:57am EST
  

• The Spanish Banks' Growing War Chest

  Leslie Crawford had another very useful article in the Financial Times last week (a handy addition to this earlier one). According to Crawford the Spanish banks are accumulating a “war chest” of assets to be used later as collateral to access European Central Bank credit in the event their liquidity needs [...]
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  Posted: February 19, 2008, 7:27am EST
  

• Toshihiko Fukui's Term At The BoJ

  Toshihiko Fukui will retire as governor, after five years at the helm of the Bank of Japan, on the 19th March. His successor may well be announced this week. This morning in the Financial Times David Pilling has a long, and very "fair and balanced" asseessment of Fukui's time at [...]
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  Posted: February 18, 2008, 4:24am EST
  

• Turning The Screw on Hungary; Three Possible Tipping Points

  Hungary's forint firmed slightly today after standing up to several waves of pressure, settling around what still amounts to a one-week low against the euro. The mildly favourable retail sales data that came out in the US during the afternoon eased some of the pressures on emerging market economies and [...]
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  Posted: February 13, 2008, 4:18pm EST
  

• Are Spain's Banks Likely To Be Spared Global Financial Pain?

  So are Spains banks likely to escape the pain associated with the global financial turmoil? Well the Financial Times' Gillian Tett obviously thinks they are, and she has been argueing her case in two interesting and valuable pieces in the Financial Times - "Spanish banks spared huge writedowns" (Feb4 2008), [...]
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  Posted: February 11, 2008, 6:30am EST
  

• Sapin's Election Hubris and the Property Bust

  Leslie Crawford has a reasonably balanced contribution to an opinion editorial in the Financial Times today, where he raises the issue of the excessive optimism of the Spanish government in the face of the growing crisis here. As he notes ...."Only the government predicts Spain will grow by as much [...]
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  Posted: February 07, 2008, 3:42am EST
  

• Emerging Market Correction and Pressure on the Forint

  Unfortunately Hungary's coming correction seems to be getting very near now. Portfolio Hungary reports this morning on the latest readings on the Calyon Risk Aversion Barometer. Caylon reported on Monday that global equity gyrations continue to dictate the direction of emerging market currencies, with risk aversion remaining high and European [...]
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  Posted: January 29, 2008, 8:36am EST
  

• Italian Employment, Earnings and Consumption

  Italy is currently entering into what offers all the indications of being a major political gridlock. At the same time the Italian economy is slowing visibly, and the Bank of Italy only last week lowered their growth forecast for the Italian economy to a mere 1%. Given what is happening [...]
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  Posted: January 21, 2008, 10:40am EST
  

• Getting Choppy

  Well there I was, quietly working away on a series of studious posts about the German, Italian and Japanese labour markets, trying to justify - following an exchange in comments - why I think creating a lot of additional employment among the over 55s won't offset the shortage of bright [...]
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  Posted: January 21, 2008, 10:32am EST
  

• The French Economy Is Back At Number 5 Globally

  Well, following the good results for French GDP produced in Q3 2007 (as detailed in this post here) - and the weakening performance of the UK economy as the credit crunch starts to really bite, we have a surprising result: "The size of the British economy has slipped below that of [...]
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  Posted: January 14, 2008, 5:03am EST
  

• Czech Republic To Hold Fire On Euro Membership

  Monetary policy experts in the Czech Republic are having second thoughts about the advisability of adopting the euro in the near future, based presumeably on the experience of those who have gone for rapid euro convergence. According to central bank board member Robert Holmanhe the Czech Republic is "not ready" [...]
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  Posted: January 11, 2008, 8:51am EST
  

• Inflation In Russia and Ukraine

  The inflation bonfire just burns and burns, across a group of countries originating in the Baltics, passing through Bulgaria and Romania, then on up via Poland and the Ukraine to Russia. As I say in my last post, the only real doubt is whether or not this is some sort [...]
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  Posted: January 11, 2008, 4:23am EST
  

• Chile's Central Bank Raises Interest Rates, What Happens Next?

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  Posted: January 11, 2008, 4:06am EST
  

• As German Exports Wane, Is Reform Fatigue Arriving?

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  Posted: January 10, 2008, 4:23am EST
  

• EU Commission Eurozone Economic Sentiment Index December 2007

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  Posted: January 08, 2008, 3:06am EST
  

• Romanian Central Bank Raises Rates Again

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  Posted: January 07, 2008, 9:23am EST
  

• Employment and Unemployment in Italy

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  Posted: January 06, 2008, 10:10am EST
  

• Merry Xmas and A Happy New Year

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  Posted: December 24, 2007, 1:52pm EST
  

• German GFK Consumer Confidence January 2008

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  Posted: December 24, 2007, 7:38am EST