Credit Writedowns

The Financial Times is reporting that Portugal is likely to need an extension of the three-year bailout plan it received in 2010. This is a disaster for the euro zone and I am writing this post to explain why. The most pressing issue is…

Some are expecting the latest surge in US home construction to lift economic growth. Even though it is indeed a positive development, construction however will have only a limited contribution to the GDP.

It occurs to me that the whole furore over patents in the software industry really revolves around the role of government in setting the regulatory ground rules for business and government’s influence in the private sector. A recent post in…

The banks are slowly admitting losses, but Bloomberg's summary is of a slow recognition. Even so, writedowns have left the banks stranded: unable to make loans. Up until now, it appears, the banks and the government were able to carry the…

Two months ago, we got four scenarios for the fiscal cliff via Credit Suisse and Sober Look. All of these scenarios called for at least a 0.9% drag on the economy, meaning that we should fully expect at least a 0.9% drop in annualized GDP…

Bill Gross has admitted that he has started buying Spanish and Italian debt. That's quite a turnaround given he had been saying earlier that he wouldn't touch their sovereign debt with a ten-foot barge pole. So the question is why. And the…

This is a quick piece here on the labor participation rate, following up on the piece I wrote last week about the jobs numbers not being consistent with recession. Mike Shedlock at Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis and Bill McBride at…

By Marc Chandler The US dollar and Japanese yen are starting the week on a firm note, despite their respective markets closed for holidays. The gains are concentrated against the major European currencies, with the dollar-itself little…

The following is an excerpt of an article written exactly twenty years ago on 8 October 1992 by the late Wynne Godley, a British economist, who predicted disaster for Europe’s planned single currency. This is the single most cogent and…

By Michael Pettis I recently “debated” twice with senior Chinese officials on the future prospects for China. In both cases they made the argument that Chinese growth rates were going to rise in the next few years and that the current deep…