ShareLast night I wrote an article reminding you that downside risk remains in the global economy.  While I have been singing a more bullish tune in regards to the prospect of a technical recovery in 2009, I am concerned about a double dip as a likely outcome.
And for the record, I have said I see [...]

On a recent Bloomberg Radio with Tom Keene broadcast, Harvey Pitt and Arthur Levitt, two former SEC Chairman were guests. Levitt made the suggestion that hedge funds had once been given the choice of “regulation-light” or “regulation-heavy.” Now, in the wake of the Madoff scandal, “regulation-heavy” is all but assured. But, isn’t this just?

ShareWillem Buiter has a very useful and provocative blog at the Financial Times website called Mavercon.  The Dutch-born former Bank of England MPC member is not afraid to take policy makers to task or call a spade a spade.
In his latest post on why banks are refusing to lend to creditworthy customers, he has some [...]

SharePolitics
As the time for Barack Obama to take office moves ever closer, his policy team is coming into view. Obama has appointed a slew of economic advisors including Tim Geithner, Larry Summers and Paul Volcker. In addition, he looks to have filled out the key positions in his White House staff and to [...]

Since everyone and his sister can become a bank, why not a central banker cum professor and his wife? Willem Buiter understands the absurdity of granting any financial institution in America bank holding status. He understands this is one big handout to financial services. Therefore, he has decided to become a bank too.

Just a few moments ago I caught a very interesting post on Alice Cook’s site UK Bubble. The gist of the post was that things are falling apart in Ireland very quickly. Given what we saw with Iceland, I have to ask: is Ireland next?

I wouldn’t suppose that things are this fragile but we cannot dismiss out of hand talk of Ireland going the way of Iceland. Here is what Alice posted:

ShareBelow is a link to an article I wrote about the Bank of England’s aggressive 1.5% interest rate cut that appeared in yesterday’s Guardian newspaper.
The unkindest cut, GuardianThe long and short of it is that I am very skeptical about the need for such a large cut. Many pundits felt the BoE was behind [...]

ShareI have been a bit on edge of late because of the credit crisis that is making headlines. Recently, a lot of people have been duped into believing that the economic crisis we are experiencing is not critical and have their eyes focused elsewhere. However, this event is potentially the most critical event in [...]

ShareWith the Economic Patriot Act past the Senate – including hundreds of billions in pork barrel – sweeteners, it’s time to focus in a little on politics. I’ll lead off the round-up there, trying to keep it fair despite my obvious anti-McCain-Palin bias.
Then we’ll turn to the usual fare of credit crisis news and [...]

ShareThe latest government intervention into the capitalist system is the move by the UK and U.S. governments to ban short-selling of all financial stocks outright.
In the wake of the severe market turbulence unleashed by the failure of Lehman Brothers, the government has decided to insert itself into the marketplace and prop up share prices by [...]