Only one central banker spotted the subprime crisis before it occurred – William White. Now he is warning that the world will have to revive the Old Testament concept of “debt jubilees“, with much of today’s debt being written off: “Debts have continued to build up over the last eight years and they have reached such […]
Chemicals and the Economy
Japan goes back into recession as stimulus policies fail, again
This week’s economic data from Japan confirmed, once again, that demographic changes are far more important for the economy than monetary stimulus. Japan’s premier Abe took power in 2012, promising to end the decline in Japan’s economic growth. He appointed a new Governor for the Bank of Japan, and claimed that his “3 arrows policy” […]
Deflation returns to the major economies as stimulus fails, again
Next week, I will publish my annual Budget Outlook, covering the 2016-2018 period. The aim, as always, is to challenge conventional wisdom when this seems to be heading in the wrong direction: The 2007 Outlook ‘Budgeting for a Downturn‘, and 2008’s ‘Budgeting for Survival’ meant I was one of the few to forecast the 2008 Crisis 2009′s ‘Budgeting […]
1 in 5 of world population will be in New Old 55+ generation
An amazing development is taking place in the world today. For the first time in human history, more people are joining the 55+ age group than the 25 – 54 age group: 600m people will be joining the New Old 55+ cohort between now and 2030, taking their numbers to 1.8bn This is twice the […]
Inflation turns to deflation as stimulus debt now has to be repaid
Its not what we know that causes the major problems. Its what we think we know, but don’t. We know, for example, that markets balance supply and demand by shifting prices up and down. Too much demand and/or too little supply, will mean higher prices and inflation. This is what happened as the BabyBoom took place: Medical […]
Policymakers’ out-of-date economic models fail to create growth, again
Since 2010, May/June has seen the US Federal Reserve start to realise it would have to revise its optimistic New Year forecast that economic recovery was inevitable. As its deputy chairman, Stanley Fischer, noted last August “Year after year we have had to explain from mid-year on why the global growth rate has been lower than […]
Economic impact of ageing populations is obvious, but ignored
Too many policymakers, companies and investors are continuing to ignore the dramatic changes taking place in the age profile of the global population. Yet common sense tells us these must have a major impact on the economy. The impact comes from 2 equally important developments: One is the rise in the number of people in the New […]
European interest rates go negative as Draghi boosts stock markets
Historians will not look kindly on Mario Draghi, head of the European Central Bank. They will ask what he thought he was doing, issuing an extra €1tn ($1.05tn) of debt from March 2015, when the Eurozone was already struggling under a dead-weight of government debt: In the big countries, Italy has $47k of debt per person; […]
Fertility rates have collapsed in the world’s 10 largest economies
One of the great myths of our time is that the world’s population is inevitably growing. Almost everyone has heard that the population is certain to reach 9bn by 2050, from today’s 7.3bn. Yet births in 2013 in the G7 economies (almost half of the global economy) were at the lowest level since the Great Depression year […]
Oil prices have further to fall as US inventory hits new records
Another week, and another record high for US oil inventories. Oil prices clearly have some way to go, before they return to being based on the fundamentals of supply and demand. Thankfully, the looking-glass world of $100/bbl prices has finally begun to shatter over the past 9 months. And we can expect prices to return to historical […]