Skip to Content

Tag Archives: China

Mervyn King’s alarmist warning

According to the World Gold Council, Mervyn King, former governor of the Bank of England, believes that in certain circumstances China’s assets in the US could be “annulled”. Mervyn King’s alarmist warning is  made in an interview, entitled “Present perilous, future imperfect” that appears in the June issue of Gold Investor,  a WGC publication.  After pointing…
» Continue Reading

‘The Money Trap’ now

The book argued that the crisis was the joint product of  inflation targeting, irresponsible banking and a weak international monetary system. The book tried to show how these were inter-related: First, inflation targeting, which had been a valuable tool in combatting 1970s inflation, had by the 2000s outlived its usefulness as a guide and discipline for…
» Continue Reading

Failure to grasp the implications of global finance

    It could go either way – towards “sauve qui peut” nationalism, withdrawal from international cooperation, a turning away from globalisation; or towards a remaking of the international system and regulatory apparatus in an effort to harness the benefits of globalisation for citizens.   It could depend on chance events.  The downing of a…
» Continue Reading

The importance of getting money right

The experience people have of the world, their life chances, what they learn, how they live, where they live, indeed their entire social and personal lives are shaped by monetary relationships, the monetary economy and thus to the world monetary system to an extent completely unprecedented in history. This means getting money wrong will have…
» Continue Reading

Beijing sets out its stall

  Although the gloss has worn off the market’s initial enthusiastic endorsement of Beijing’s ambitious reform plans unveiled last month, there is little doubt they represent a major further move towards freeing financial markets – and promoting the international role of the RMB.   In addition to changes in how companies file for stock market…
» Continue Reading

The Meltzer plan for world money

  Professor Allan Meltzer has for some years advocated a reform of international monetary arrangements based on a joint adoption by large economies or areas of similar inflation targets. This is a summary.   The US, the Euro, Japan and China (if it ends its currency controls) should adopt a common 0 to 2 percent…
» Continue Reading

Fred Bergsten calls for monetary reform

Fred Bergsten of the Peterson Institute is the “enfant terrible” of US international monetary and economic debate. Fending off the passing years, it is a role he has played with great panache for the best part of half a century. Always at the centre of things, always provocative, frequently infuriating, he has, as head of the…
» Continue Reading

How the international monetary system holds back recovery

  Ever since the end of Bretton Woods, exchange rate volatility driven by diverse monetary policies and diverse expectations about future exchange rates have been frequent sources of shocks to the world economy and national economies. The very existence of independent central banks with independent monetary policies is the common origin of shocks. The more…
» Continue Reading

Man is born free and everywhere he is in debt

Like Jean-Jacques Rousseau, David Graeber is fascinated by the past. Indeed, Graeber might have started his book (“Debt: the first 5,000 years”) with an echo of the famous opening of The Social Contract: “Man is born free and everywhere he is in chains”. But perhaps he thought that would be presumptuous.   Graeber starts off…
» Continue Reading

Why Asia did not cause the financial crises

    New attempts are being made to resuscitate the “savings glut” hypothesis of the origins of the great financial collapse and recession and the eurozone’s agony. This hypothesis is wrong.   What matters is not saving but financing. Countries running current account surpluses do not finance those running current account deficits.The deficits are financed…
» Continue Reading