Fear of finance: Financial stability is a growing concern of central banks

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Financial stability is a growing concern of central banks. Only some should be worried

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Fear of finance

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Central banks

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Fear of finance

CENTRAL bankers have gathered at their annual shindig in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, for the past ten years with only one thing on their minds: the health of the global economy. This year’s gathering is different. The bankers’ preoccupations are changing, from recovery to financial stability.
Oddly, rising concern about the risks of financial excess is good news. It reflects the arrival of the first synchronised global economic upswing since 2010. GDP growth in the quarter ending in June was the most rapid since then, according to JPMorgan Chase, thanks to stronger-than-expected activity in China, Japan and Europe …

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Economics brief: The natural rate of unemployment

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Policymakers have spent half a century in search of the natural rate of unemployment. The fifth in our series on big economic ideas

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Central bankers’ holy grail

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The natural rate of unemployment

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Economics brief

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WHY does unemployment exist? If there is a central question in macroeconomics, this is it. There are few bigger wastes than the loss to idleness of hours, days and years by people who would rather be working. Unemployment can ruin lives, sink budgets and topple governments. Yet policymakers do not wage all-out war on joblessness. Most, like the Federal Reserve, America’s central bank, target what is known as unemployment’s “natural” …

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Cash Aid Could Solve Poverty — But There’s A Catch

A major study in Zambia showed the benefits of just giving poor people money with no strings attached. So why isn’t the government entirely convinced?

(Image credit: Nurith Aizenman/NPR)

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Ten years on: Where might the next crisis come from?

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TEN years ago, BNP Paribas, a French bank, temporarily suspended dealings in three funds, citing “the complete evaporation of liquidity in certain market segments of the US securitisation market”. Many people treat this as the start of the credit crunch but one can trace it back to the need for Bear Stearns to rescue hedge funds that invested in mortgage-backed securities in June, or the signs of home loan defaults and failing mortgage lenders that emerged in late 2006. The subsequent tightening of credit and loss of confidence in the banking system eventually led to the collapse of Lehman Brothers, when the crisis reached its height in the autumn of 2008 (see picture).The inevitable question on the occasion of such anniversaries is: could it happen again? Total debt has risen, rather than fallen, over the last decade, reaching $217trn or 327% of GDP, according to the Institute for International Finance. But the debt is differently distributed from 2007; more of it is owed by governments and more of it is owned by central banks. Since these banks have no incentive to hassle countries for repayment, the air of crisis has dissipated. Banks have more capital, making them more secure. And low interest rates have made servicing debt more affordable for both consumers and …

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The punishment continues: America’s new economic sanctions may hurt Russia’s recovery

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Do economic restrictions change Russian behaviour?

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The punishment continues

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Sanctions on Russia

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IN LATE June Daimler, a German carmaker, broke ground on a new Mercedes-Benz plant north-west of Moscow. “We are confident in the long-term potential of Russia,” Markus Schäfer, a board member, said at the ceremony. The €250m ($296m) factory marked the first investment by a Western carmaker since America and the European Union slapped sanctions on Russia as punishment for its aggression in Ukraine three years ago.
After more than two years of recession, Russia is …

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