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Showing posts with the label Euro

A big shakedown?

It's already mid-October. A lot of predictions have been made that once summer is over, there is going to be an economic collapse. A lot of signs seem to be pointing towards it, to wit:  - countries unable to service their sovereign debt, coming close to running out of money  - cost of borrowing increasing, e.g. Spain's rating dropping to BBB+  - the people in countries like Greece protesting against the austerity measures (which is not effective to my mind, the austerities that is, not the protesting) Lets look at it in simple terms: I believe this crisis is brought about by human failings, not because of fancy economic terms. Firstly - lack of integrity :  - Did Greece fudge their numbers to get into the Eurozone? They did, didn't they? So from the get-go, they got in based on lying. So there is no basis for them to be in there.  - Going way back, reneging on the gold standard is what goes us all here in the first place. Secondly - intellectual l...

Greece and the Eurozone

Can't help but think that the current problem rests on two basic things: 1. That Greece fudged its numbers to be eligible to enter the Eurozone 2. That the Euro members don't want to let Greece out for fear of losing face So the crux of the matter is that their membership is based on a lie and for the sake of ego, the other countries are expecting Germany to continue lending money to Greece to service its loans. It doesn't make sense to do so! Face the facts, the due diligence was not done properly and structurally, the Greek economy was not prepared for the influx of cheap money coming in on the back of strong credit ratings which are not theirs. Of course, if we are pointing fingers, then part of the blame also lies in the intellectual laziness of the analysts who conveniently combined the credit ratings and averaged them out, thus making it seem that Greece was more credit worthy than it actually was. [The reverse also happened in the Asian Financial Crisis whe...