This link has been bookmarked by 293 people . It was first bookmarked on 11 Aug 2006, by AJ.
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Eurozone PMI Declines 7th Month; German Private Sector Output Falls at Faster Rate; New Business Declines 13th Month
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Damned Either Way
The problem is that if Spain leaves the euro and returns to the peseta, it will be caught in a downward currency spiral like the ones suffered by Mexico in 1982 and 1994 and Korea in 1997. In both cases the currency plunged by far more than the amount of its theoretical overvaluation. This happened because a substantial portion of Mexican and Korean debt was denominated in foreign currency. Of course once Spain revives the peseta, it will be in a similar position – with a lot of its debt denominated in euros, which will become a foreign currency.
What does external debt have to do with the extent of the devaluation? Quite a lot, it turns out. Mexico and Korea (and a host of others examples) remind us that when a country is forced to devalue, the amount of the devaluation is not necessarily in line with estimates of the amount of overvaluation. -
I would argue that Spain probably suffers from 15-20% overvaluation, but once Spain returns to the peseta the peseta will not devalue by that amount. It will devalue by at least 50%, and probably a lot more. Why? Because of the self-reinforcing relationship between the currency and external debt.
It always works the same way when a country with a lot of external debt devalues its currency. As the peseta devalues, Spain’s external debt will rise in tandem since it is denominated in the appreciating currency. Since Spain is already believed to be overly indebted, as the debt rises relative to domestic assets, Spanish credibility will decline quickly and financial distress costs will rise. -
But of course as credibility declines and defaults rise, the peseta will drop even more as investors flee the currency and as domestic borrowers with euro-denominated debt try to hedge the currency risk. This will go on in a self-reinforcing way until the currency has been crushed. In the end, for Spain to leave the euro would probably cause its external debt to more than double – perhaps even triple – as the peseta falls. Of course it will be forced into default within days or weeks.
This, by the way, is not an argument for Spain to stay in the euro. If Spain stays in the euro we will still arrive at default, but much more slowly, and mainly at first through a grinding away of wages and economic growth over many, many years and a gradual building up of debt as Germany refinances Spanish debt at interest rates that exceed GDP growth rates. The default will occur anyway, but only after years of high unemployment. -
This is simply part of the logic of sovereign financial distress – declining credibility causes stakeholders to act in ways that reduce credibility further. What’s more, deterioration in the political process is part of financial distress at the sovereign level. Remember, as Keynes pointed out back in 1922, that resolving these kinds of crises is always political – it is about which sector of the economy (or class) ends up paying for the adjustment.
Workers can pay in the form of high unemployment and declining wages, the middle class can pay by having its savings inflated away, private businesses can pay in the form of confiscatory taxes and expropriation, creditors can pay through forced debt forgiveness, and so on, but ultimately someone must pay. Politics becomes about deciding which groups will be forced to foot the bill. Historical precedents suggest that political fault lines are likely to develop as different groups organizes politically to protect themselves -
This is why I think Henkel’s proposal makes sense. Rather than have Spain leave the euro, Germany can leave the euro. The new German currency would automatically appreciate and the euro would depreciate, but without the terrible debt dynamics, the adjustment in the currency value would be much closer to the theoretically correct adjustment. The relative adjustment would probably be in the 20% range rather than in the 50% range.
Of course German banks would still have a problem. Their deposits would be in the form of the new German currency, and a lot of their loans – all those to Spain, for example – would be in the depreciating euro, and so they would take large losses. But at least the losses will be less – and more importantly the process will be more orderly – than if Spain simply leaves the euro and defaults. -
One way or the other Germany is going to take a pretty big hit. It is a complete waste of time trying to figure out how to avoid it. It would be far more constructive to resolve the problem as quickly as possible in as orderly a manner as possible, and as any good Minskyite would tell you, that means we have to pay special attention to the balance sheet dynamics. That’s why I think Henkel’s proposal is an interesting one.
Of course the really interesting thing about Henkel’s proposal (at least to me) is to figure out what decision France would make if something like this happened. If France remained within the euro (i.e. “peripheral” Europe in Henkel’s scenario), the possibility of a United States of Europe would be forever dashed, but it would almost certainly be replaced with a two-entity Europe – the United States of Germany and the United States of France, or perhaps, for those who like 19th Century monetary history, the new Zollverein and the new Latin Union. -
he options for the PP, in other words, are the same as for the Socialists: either abandon the euro or accept extremely high levels of unemployment for the rest of the decade. It is unlikely that any government facing those two options can maintain popularity for very long.
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ew measures passed in Michigan will allow the state to dissolve governments, void union contracts, toss aside elected school-board members, close schools and authorize charter schools. Thankfully, those measures are being put to good use.
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Frida LeeThoughts on the global economy, housing, gold, silver, interest rates, oil, energy, China, commodities, the dollar, Euro, Renminbi, Yen, inflation, deflation, stagflation, precious metals, emerging markets, and policy decisions that affect the global mar
Business Economics Finance Banking Housing Trading Voices|Ideas Imported
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Clearly, the US Government will continue to bail out insolvent banks no matter what it costs taxpayers
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My Translation: "This new capital will not cost anyone anything. It will be dispensed by magic fairies and recovered at a later date. We cannot share exactly how this magic works because under the rules of the magic ministry, we would be stripped of our magic hats and lose the rights to dispense magic if we did. Trust us. This is the proverbial free lunch that everyone says does not exist. However, like magic pixie dust, it does exist, it really does."
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Citigroup is pressing the US government to agree on a new capital injection that would increase the authorities’ stake in the troubled bank to about 40 per cent but stop short of an outright nationalisation.
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Top Government Officials – who are trying to establish seeking a want a more strategic and less ad hoc response to the crisis – were and are anxious to avoid if possible the type of Sunday night crisis announcement that became a staple for Hank Paulson for ’s crisis management at the Treasury last year.
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Citigroup Is A Black Hole
Citigroup is a black hole, sucking in every dollar thrown at it and it still wants more. No amount seems enough to save it. Taxpayers have already guaranteed a whopping $300 billion dollars worth of Citigroup debt. Now, two months later, Citigroup is begging for still more capital, pretending that will save it. -
How the hell can you preserve a system this way? The answer is you can't. Nonetheless the Obama administration tries to end bank nationalization talk.
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Geithner is attempting to bail out his banking buddies, no more, no less, and he does not give a damn what it costs taxpayers to do so. And while everyone and their brother has hopped on the Nationalization Train (please see The Nationalization Train Has Left The Station), I think there are at a bare minimum a half dozen questions that need to be addressed first (please see Nationalization Revisited).
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it is worthless. In fact, Citigroup is less than worthless because without more taxpayer cash infusions it cannot survive.
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To hell with Citigroup. Bust it up and sell it. It's the best possible outcome for everyone involved.
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Page Comments
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