Wednesday, December 16, 2009, 4:35PM ET - U.S. Markets Closed.
Central bankers around the world are pulling out all the stops in order to combat a severe economic downturn that threatens to get even worse.
"There is a global deflationary risk," says Nouriel Roubini, economics professor at NYU Stern School and chairman of RGE Monitor. "That's what central bankers are worried about."
In Europe today, the ECB and Bank of England slashed rates by greater than expected levels. Meanwhile, the Fed and Bank of Japan are taking "unorthodox actions" to pump liquidity into their economies. Both central banks are engaged in "quantitative easing," meaning rates are effectively zero regardless of what the official policy is.
"The Fed is trying to preemptively avoid a deflation trap [which] is very dangerous," Roubini says. "Whether they'll be successful or not, I don't know."
The problem, he says, is there's going to be a "severe recession" both in the U.S. and globally in 2009. That means falling demand for goods and increased slack in the labor markets. That will put further downward pressure on prices and raise the risk of outright deflation, which is defined as: A persistent decline in general price levels, typically accompanied by a severe contraction in employment and economic output.
"It's hard to undo the structural factor" of falling demand meeting a supply glut of goods and services, he says, recommending the following policy actions to try and stem the deflationary tide:
Don't people realize that the actual bailout tab is now up over $8 trillion. We have effectively doubled our national debt. A debt we couldn't pay off in the first place. The $24 trillion question is, who is the holder of our debt. Clue. Offshore banking made possible by the British Crown.
Deflation is made to sound like a cancer--it's not!! We must deflate before we can stabilize the economy. The deleveraging will be painful but it must be done globaly or it will not save the global economy.
Recapitalize the banks faster so they can loan us our own tax money.
the economy is tanked get ready for the great deppression its getting worse
We need to involve more governament in privet companies, i mean we have to control salary to managers, and we have to make the salary from the profit, created a roof non more then that. Also, everynthing socialize is non comunist, we have to stop to be antagonist when the situaton riquire that.Otherways we have tow kind of thif, I mean uno by pen and the other one by gun Sal
Anyone wanting deflation is crazy, simple.
We can all thank the republicans for this!
I am downgrading the financials and real estate again and retail. Basically, if you are not in a recessionary stock, you will be downgraded. This is a positive feedback cycle and the panic we are seeing is by companies now. So, as long as the jobs keep losing, we are going lower.
get ready for the great deppression its going to get a lot worse
ok fellow dickweeds, what caused the problem in the first place? I think it was EASY CREDIT! and maybe expanding the money supply to BANKS! and now lets fix it by......Making MORE funny money...how clever and ingenious...Lets bail out the bailout. where MY bailout?
Falling prices are bad for consumers?......hmmmm
Unfortunately, I was too optimistic a week ago.....Depression is on the frontier. Uncle Ben needs to make interest rates zero and stop the TARP...because then the banks just hoard money. Like I have been saying all along...the consumer MUST be saved for any ground to be made.
I agree, it's going to get worse before it gets better, but major deflation isn't in the cards.
How can we start to improve if you keep parading these “after the fact” economists? Stop bringing this guy on. He’s not helping!
Screwed pooches are going to be dropping more puppies for sometime to come
Downgrades: Commercial Real Estate. A lot of pundits think this is safe and are recommending this as a safe haven....if we have learned anything....this will be next because tech was thought safe wasn't it?
Bear Roubini is in his element. He's been waiting for 30 years to expound his views and it will probably be 2040 before we hear from him again.
Crime is getting out of control too. All indicators say this thing is getting worse and not in final stages...My target for the dow is now to retest 7500 and possibly break through it by 2009. More deleveraging is needed but the problem is future consumer spending has deleveraged COMPLETELY. I am predicting 12% unemployment and downgrading Simon Property Group to $25 price target.
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Mark - Thursday December 04, 2008 12:28PM EST
socialist