Politicas economicas no G7: os ortodoxos viraram keynesianos...

Na verdade, já eram, só ficaram ainda mais. Ou seja, encontre uma tia rica que pague o seu cartão de crédito, ou jogue as dívidas para seus filhos e netos...

Desculpem-me pelo simplismo, mas é isso que estão fazendo os países mais avançados (???: em quê exatamente?).

Paulo Roberto de Almeida 

Dos realidades en Jackson Hole

El Pais Economia / by Santiago Carbó, 26/08/2014

La conferencia anual en Jackson Hole (Wyoming) ha cumplido las expectativas y ha dejado mensajes muy claros sobre el devenir de la política monetaria en los próximos meses. Los discursos de los máximos mandatarios de la Fed y del Banco Central Europeo, Janet Yellen y Mario Draghi expresaban, sin embargo, realidades muy diferentes que conllevan acciones también distintas. Tal vez uno de los aspectos más interesantes de la cita de este año es que el tema principal del debate era el mercado de trabajo. Las preocupaciones expresadas en torno al desempleo revelan las desiguales circunstancias de forma evidente: en Estados Unidos las discusiones se han enfocado en la calidad del empleo creado y en cómo medir el desempleo de forma más certera y en “tiempo real”. En la eurozona, el problema es más perentorio y grave: cómo crecer para crear puestos de trabajo y que los ciudadanos noten de verdad una recuperación económica que precisamente ahora está de nuevo en cuestión.
Lo bueno de Jackson Hole es que, de alguna manera, los responsables de la política monetaria encuentran en aquel idílico paisaje un salvoconducto temporal para expresarse con mayor libertad de lo que habitualmente pueden hacer. Apuntando no sólo la visión de largo plazo de sus instituciones, sino también su perspectiva y matices personales. Dado que la urgencia aprieta, a Draghi se le notó algo más suelto de lo habitual y, sin perder rigor académico, envió mensajes contundentes que pueden marcarle, una vez más, como game changer en la eurozona. En dos niveles.
El primero se refirió a su mandato y situó la preocupación por la deflación en un plano de gravedad que hasta ahora no se había mostrado. De hecho, apeló de forma extraordinaria a combinar dos grandes medidas para relanzar la recuperación económica en el área del euro: ampliar las acciones extraordinarias de política monetaria y coordinar las políticas fiscales. Respecto a lo que queda dentro de su capacidad, se avanzó que el estímulo programado del crédito mediante los TLTRO desde septiembre podría verse complementado con compras de activos. En relación con las políticas fiscales, Draghi cambió las tornas con una petición dura a los Gobiernos europeos para realizar una de las pocas acciones fiscales que es compatible con la austeridad: la coordinación de acciones de estímulo, tanto de demanda como de oferta.
El segundo nivel del discurso de Draghi fue el más técnico, pero igualmente crudo. Se trataba de la situación del mercado de trabajo en la eurozona. El desempleo se presentó como un problema extraordinariamente desigual a lo largo de la geografía europea, achacable tanto a factores cíclicos como estructurales y en el que España aparecía como una de las realidades más preocupantes, a pesar incluso de los esfuerzos realizados, lo que supone una apelación a mayores reformas. De forma general, lo que Europa se está jugando es si entrar en una tercera recesión —la dimisión en bloque del Gobierno francés ayer confirma esta encrucijada— con la que se encontraría con la deflación absolutamente de cara y aunque el BCE actúe, las reformas pueden ser el único puntal de crecimiento a largo plazo.
Por el lado estadounidense, el mensaje más claro era digno de envidia al otro lado del Atlántico. Yellen admitió que la recuperación se estaba acelerando y que existía un consenso al respecto y anticipó subidas de tipos de interés. En todo caso, teniendo en cuenta la inflación en Europa, es posible que los tipos de interés reales no sean muy diferentes durante algún tiempo. Pero aunque eso pueda hacer que la ensalada monetaria parezca similar, la realidad es que ambos lados del Atlántico el aderezo es muy distinto. En Estados Unidos sabe dulce y en Europa es muy agrio.

Islandia e Irlanda: as verdadeiras causas da crise (nao as atribuidas...)

Corre a versão, em certos setores ingênuos, mal informados, ou simplesmente deliberadamente deformados (ou seja, mistificadores, mentirosos, fraudadores, equivocados e enganadores, e nem preciso dizer quem é), de que as crises financeiras dos países desenvolvidos, a partir de 2008 -- sucedendo ao estouro da bolha imobiliária em 2007 -- foram provodadas por manobras especulativas de loiros de olhos azuis, pela ambição desmedida dos banqueiros de Wall Street, enfim pela cupidez habitual do capitalismo financeiro, sempre tão propenso a privatizar lucros e a socializar prejuizos.
A história, obviamente, é mais complexa do que isso, e se houve especulação, cabe lembrar que nenhum banqueiro ganancioso, nenhum especulador de Wall Street, nenhum manipulador de mercado, seja ele preto, loiro, azul ou vermelho, tem a capacidade de fixar os juros de referência.
Quem faz isso são os bancos centrais, que sinalizam, portanto, para o resto do sistema financeiro, e para a sociedade em geral, quais os níveis que serão praticados nos mercados imobiliários, de créditos para consumo, investimento, etc.
Juros baixos, obviamente, são uma benção para devedores, investidores e outros inadimplentes, enquanto são uma maldição para poupadores e credores. O mundo não é o ideal, e se os mercados fossem livres, realmente, como proclamam aqueles que acreditam equivocadamente que o sistema financeiro não tem regras (quando as tem, e muitas), esses mercados jamais fixariam as taxas de juros em níveis artificialmente baixos durante tanto tempo, como fizeram o Federal Reserve (de 2002 a 2005) e diversos outros bancos centrais.
Em resumo, quem provocou verdadeiramente as crises foram os bancos centrais, não os mercados, como demonstra este articulista sobre os casos mais dramáticos da Islância e da Irlanda...
Paulo Roberto de Almeida 

Ire and Ice: A Tale of Two PIIIGS
by Frank Shostak 
Mises Daily, November 22, 2012

There were a lot of commentaries regarding the Ireland and Iceland 2008–2012 financial crises. Most of the commentaries were confined to the description of the events without addressing the essential causes of the crises. We suggest that providing a detailed description of events cannot be a substitute for economic analysis, which should be based on the essential causes behind a crisis. The essential cause is the primary driving force that gives rise to various events such as reckless bank lending (blamed by most commentators as the key cause behind the crisis) and a so-called overheated economy. Now, in terms of real GDP, both Ireland and Iceland displayed strong performance prior to the onset of the crisis in 2008. During 2000–2007, the average growth in Ireland stood at 5.9 percent versus 4.6 percent in Iceland. So what triggered the sudden collapse of these economies?

Central-Bank Policy the Key Trigger for Economic Boom
What set in motion the economic boom (i.e., a strong real GDP rate of growth) in both Ireland and Iceland was an aggressive lowering of interest rates by the respective central banks of Ireland and Iceland. In Ireland, the policy rate was lowered from 13.75 percent in November 1992 to 2 percent by November 2005. In Iceland, the policy rate was lowered from 10.8 percent in November 2000 to 5.2 percent by April 2004.

In response to this, bank lending showed a visible strengthening with the yearly rate of growth of Irish bank assets rising from 7.4 percent in June 2002 to 31 percent by November 2005. In Iceland, the yearly rate of growth of bank lending to residents climbed from 26.5 percent in September 2004 to 57.8 percent by April 2006.

The growth momentum of the money supply strengthened visibly in both Ireland and Iceland. The yearly rate of growth of our measure of money supply (AMS) for Ireland jumped from minus 6.7 percent in March 2003 to 22 percent by March 2006. In Iceland, the yearly rate of growth of AMS climbed from minus 1.6 percent in January 2003 to 61.6 percent by June 2004 before closing at 47.7 percent by July 2004.

The aggressive lowering of interest rates, coupled with strong increases in the money-supply rate of growth, gave rise to various bubble activities. (The central banks' loose monetary stance set in motion the transfer of wealth from wealth-generating activities to nonproductive bubble activities.)

Central-Bank Policies Trigger Economic Bust
Because of strong increases in the money-supply rate of growth, a visible strengthening in price inflation took place in Ireland and Iceland. In Ireland, the yearly rate of growth of the consumer price index (CPI) rose from 2.9 percent in January 2006 to 5.1 percent by March 2007. In Iceland, the yearly rate of growth of the CPI jumped from 1.4 percent in January 2003 to 18.6 percent by January 2009.

To counter the acceleration in price inflation, the central banks of Ireland and Iceland subsequently tightened their stance. The policy interest rate in Ireland rose from 2.25 percent in January 2006 to 4.25 percent by July 2008. In Iceland, the rate shot up from 10.2 percent in January 2006 to 18 percent by February 2009. Furthermore, the pace of money pumping by the central bank of Ireland fell to minus 8.2 percent by July 2007 from 25 percent in January 2007. The pace of pumping by the Iceland's central bank fell to 43 percent by February 2008 from 123 percent in July 2006.

The yearly rate of growth of AMS in Ireland plunged from 32 percent in August 2009 to minus 30 percent by November 2011. In Iceland, the yearly rate of growth of AMS fell from 96 percent in October 2007 to minus 18 percent by September 2009.

The sharp fall in the growth momentum of the money supply, coupled with a tighter interest-rate stance, put pressure on various bubble activities that emerged on the back of the previous loose-monetary-policy stance.

Consequently, various key economic indicators came under pressure. For instance, the unemployment rate in Ireland rose from 4.4 percent in January 2006 to 14.9 percent by July 2012. In Iceland, the unemployment rate climbed from 2 percent in January 2006 to 9.2 percent by September 2010. Year on year, the rate of growth of Irish real retail sales fell from 3.8 percent in January 2008 to minus 25 percent by September 2009. In Iceland, the yearly rate of growth of real retail sales fell from 11.9 percent in Q1 2008 to minus 31 percent by Q1 2009.

Most commentators blame the crisis on the conduct of banks that allowed the massive expansion of credit. It is held that this was responsible for the massive property boom in Ireland and overheated economic activity in Iceland.

We hold that the key factor in the economic crisis was the boom-bust policies of the central banks of Ireland and Iceland. Loose monetary policy had significantly weakened the economies' abilities in both Ireland and Iceland to generate wealth. This resulted in the weakening of various marginal activities. Consequently, a fall in these activities, followed by a decline in the pace of lending by banks — and this, in turn, coupled with a tighter stance by central banks — set in motion an economic bust. With the emergence of a recession, banks' bad assets started to pile up and this in turn posed a threat to their solvency.

From May 2007, the banks' stock prices on the Irish stock market declined markedly — they had halved by May 2008. This had an inevitable effect on banks' capital-adequacy ratios and therefore their ability to lend the ever-higher amounts that were necessary to support property prices.

As a result, housing loans as percentage of GDP plunged from 70.5 percent in Q2 2009 to 49.2 percent by Q2 this year. At the height of the boom, a fifth of Irish workers were in the construction industry. The average price of a house in Ireland in 1997 was €102,491. In Q1 2007 the price stood at €350,242 — an increase of 242 percent. The average price of a home in Dublin had increased 500 percent from 1994 to 2006.

Now, in Iceland, at the end of Q2 2008, external debt was €50 billion, more than 80 percent of which was held by the banking sector — this value compares with Iceland's 2007 GDP of €8.5 billion. The liabilities of the three main banks were almost 10 times the size of the island's GDP.

With the emergence of the bust, Icelandic authorities allowed its banks to go belly up, while the Irish government decided to support the banks. According to estimates, the cost to the taxpayers of providing support to Irish banks stood at €63 billion. (The private debt of the failed banks was nationalized.) In Iceland, the government, by allowing Icelandic banks to fail, made foreign creditors, not Icelandic taxpayers, largely responsible for covering losses.

The fact that Iceland allowed the banks to go bankrupt was a positive step in healing the economy. Unfortunately Iceland introduced a program of safeguarding the welfare of the unemployed. Also, the collapse of the Icelandic krona was a hard hit to homeowners who borrowed in foreign currency. In response to this, the authorities orchestrated mortgage-relief schemes. Iceland has also imposed draconian capital controls. Obviously, all this curtailed the benefits of allowing the banks to go belly up.

Whether the Icelandic economy will show a healthy revival, as suggested by some experts, hinges on the monetary policy of Iceland's central bank. We suggest the same applies to Ireland. (What is required is to seal off all the loopholes for the growth of the money supply.)

However, it is clear that Iceland's economic situation is less bad than Ireland's, and that is largely due to the Iceland's allowing its banks to go bankrupt.

Bad Policies Are Coming Back
For the time being in Iceland, the yearly rate of growth of AMS jumped from minus 11.3 percent in May 2010 to 34 percent by May 2012. Also, in Ireland, the growth momentum of AMS is showing strengthening with the yearly rate of growth rising from minus 30.3 percent in November last year to 4.7 percent in September 2012.

The rising growth momentum of money supply is a major threat to sound economic recovery in both Ireland and Iceland.

Also note that the policy interest rate in Ireland fell from 1.5 percent in October 2011 to 0.75 percent at present. In Iceland, the policy rate was lowered from 18 percent in February 2009 to 4.25 percent by July 2011. All this again sets in motion a misallocation of resources and new bubble activities — and, in turn, economic impoverishment.

Summary and Conclusion
Many commentators blame reckless bank lending as the key cause behind the 2008–2012 financial crises in Ireland and Iceland. Our analysis, however, suggests that it was not the banks as such that caused the crisis but rather the boom-bust policies of the central banks of Ireland and Iceland. It is these institutions that set in motion the false economic boom and the consequent economic bust. While Iceland allowed its banks to go bankrupt, the Irish government chose to bail out its banks. So, in this sense, the Icelandic authorities did the right thing, and Iceland has consequently outperformed Ireland economically. We hold that despite this positive step, Iceland's authorities have introduced various welfare schemes that have curtailed the benefits of having let banks go belly up. Furthermore, both Ireland and Iceland have resumed aggressive money pumping, thereby setting in motion the menace of boom-bust cycles.

Frank Shostak is an adjunct scholar of the Mises Institute and a frequent contributor to Mises.org. His consulting firm, Applied Austrian School Economics, provides in-depth assessments and reports of financial markets and global economies. Send him mail. See Frank Shostak's article archives.

You can subscribe to future articles by Frank Shostak via this RSS feed.

Copyright © 2012 by the Ludwig von Mises Institute. Permission to reprint in whole or in part is hereby granted, provided full credit is given.

Bancos centrais a servico de governos: missao impossivel

Não só o BC do Brasil, o FED também. Os Bancos Centrais, quase em todas as partes, se converteram em instrumentos dóceis dos governos, indo além de seus mandatos tradicionais para adentrar em políticas de estímulo keynesiano, inundando os mercados de dinheiro, praticando política fiscal, se preocupando com emprego e outras tarefas que nunca deveriam ser as deles. Bancos centrais, se precisam existir, o que não é um fato, precisam apenas resguardar o poder de compra das moedas e o bom funcionamento dos mercados financeiros, especialmente o bancário. Tudo além disso é ultrapassar suas funções precípuas.
Por isso que eles estão contribuindo para agravar a crise, ou aprofundar a recessão, em lugar de simplesmente preservar a moeda.
O Federal Reserve, por exemplo, recebeu a incumbência -- claramente demagógica e despropositada -- de defender o pleno emprego, o que nunca deveria ser sua função. Vai dar errado...
Paulo Roberto de Almeida 

O Copom se transformou em instrumento do governo

Editorial O Estado de S.Paulo, 31 de agosto de 2012

As decisões do Comitê de Política Monetária (Copom) não se vinculam mais ao seu objetivo natural, mas à política econômica ou, mais exatamente, anticíclica, em estreita colaboração com o governo. Não é mais a tendência da inflação que as dita, mas a necessidade de cumprir uma meta de crescimento do Produto Interno Bruto (PIB).

Assim, é inútil procurar adivinhar se o Copom acha que haverá um aumento dos preços. A decisão de ontem, nessa perspectiva, era esperada e foi sem surpresa que o mercado recebeu a notícia da fixação da Selic em 7,5%. A novidade foi o comunicado da reunião dizer que, "considerando os efeitos cumulativos e defasados das ações da política implementada até o momento, que em parte se refletem na recuperação em curso da atividade econômica, o Copom entende que, se o cenário prospectivo vier a comportar um ajuste adicional nas condições monetárias, esse movimento deverá ser conduzido com máxima parcimônia".

Dado o resultado restrito dessa nova política econômica, interpretou-se que o Copom encerrará o ciclo de redução da Selic com mais uma queda de 0,25 ponto de porcentagem apenas. O Copom parece estar consciente de que foi além do razoável, no papel de aprendiz de feiticeiro.

Apesar de falar da "recuperação em curso", parece que o Copom não obteve resultados à altura dos meios utilizados, embora empregando artilharia pesada. Em todos os tipos de crédito tivemos, em sete meses, um crescimento de 7,8% - e o crédito direcionado, controlado pelo governo, cresceu 8,8%. O crédito para as pessoas físicas acusou, no período, aumento de 18,7%, ante 16,7% para as pessoas jurídicas. O estoque de crédito está em 23% do PIB, nas instituições públicas, e em apenas 19,1%, nas instituições privadas nacionais. As concessões acumuladas do crédito livre, em sete meses, diminuíram de 7,2% no caso das empresas e aumentaram 3,1% para as famílias, enquanto as taxas de juros apresentaram queda de 7,8% para empresas e 9,5% para famílias.

Realmente, a atuação do Banco Central favoreceu essencialmente as pessoas físicas, e não tanto as empresas. Até agora é difícil falar, como faz o Banco Central, em recuperação econômica, mas no máximo de uma política que visou a amortecer os efeitos de uma crise mundial. Foi um período em que a taxa Selic estava alta demais e qualquer elevação dela seria excessiva. Hoje, a manipulação da taxa básica de juros é mais fácil, porém deveria continuar sendo instrumento de contenção da inflação.

A frase da semana: Ludwig von Mises

True, governments can reduce the rate of interest in the short run. They can issue additional paper money. They can open the way to credit expansion by the banks. They can thus create an artificial boom and the appearance of prosperity. But such a boom is bound to collapse soon or late and to bring about a depression.

Ludwig Von Mises 

recolhida de um dos muitos comentários a este artigo de opinião publicado no Wall Street Journal deste sábado: 

The Federal Reserve: From Central Bank to Central Planner

John Cochrane

The Wall Street Journal, September 1, 2012

Bancos Centrais ou candidatos a ditadores monetarios? - book review

O mais estranho que encontro nesses livros e nessas resenhas em torno de história monetária e estudos sobre o papel dos bancos centrais é que nunca se contesta o seu poder de monopólio sobre a emissão de moeda e seu papel quase ditatorial na fixação das taxas de juros, ambos podendo estar em total descompasso com os dados da economia real, apenas para servir a interesses de grupos ou a ideias estapafurdias dos proprios banqueiros centrais.
Enquanto não se partir da ideia de que dinheiro pode, sim, deixar de ser monopólio de tecnocratas travestidos em sábios monetários, creio que não se terá uma boa discussão dos problemas atuais da oferta e demanda de moeda...
Ou seja, todos nos transformamos em prisioneiros, reféns do monopólio dos bancos centrais, que existem, grosso modo, há duzentos anos. Muito pouco para justificar qualquer legitimidade, sobretudo depois dos desastres provocados por eles mesmos ao longo do último século...
Paulo Roberto de Almeida

------ EH.NET BOOK REVIEW ------

Title: The Age of Central Banks

Published by EH.Net (February 2012)

Curzio Giannini, The Age of Central Banks. Cheltenham, UK: Edward Elgar, 2011. xxxi + 298 pp.  $135 (hardcover), ISBN: 978-0-85793-213-6.

Reviewed for EH.Net by John H. Wood, Department of Economics, Wake Forest University.

Modern central banks are known for more than the determination of the money stock.  They are also bank regulators and handlers of financial crises.  This has always been so, Curzio Giannini, former Deputy

Director of the International Relations Department of the Bank of Italy, tells us.  He urges economists to think of money not simply as a policy variable in the neoclassical model but as “an institution that is held up by trust: trust in its future purchasing power and trust in the continued convention that payment is complete when money changes hands” (p. xxv).  At the center of the institution of money is the institution of the central bank.

The principal controversies surrounding monetary institutions – such as the British Bank Act of 1844, the Bank of England as lender of last resort, the Federal Reserve as a solution to the inelasticity of the currency, and Bretton Woods and international trade – have addressed the viability of the payments system rather than simply the price level.  Price stability was taken care of by the monetary standard

during most of history.  The growth of a complex payments system, and the need for trust, or confidence, in that system gave rise to central banks.

Given the acknowledged importance of the central bank, Giannini writes, “it may seem surprising that until quite recently it attracted very little theoretical interest” (p. xx).  Two reasons for this may be the failure of the neoclassical theoretical paradigm to reach to institutions and the tendency to take central banks as given, such as the “fiscal theory’s” treatment of them as simply financial arms of the state.  Nor in his view did Goodhart’s explanation of central banks as the institutionalization of restrictive competitive practices required by the nature of banking contribute to our understanding of their evolutionary process.  Giannini takes Hicks’ observation in A Theory of Economic History as his guide: “if monetary  theoreticians want to move forwards they must first look backwards, building a vision of how money has evolved, of how we have reached our present point” (p. 5).

“In order to study money [and therefore central banks] we must start from decentralized exchange structures in which concepts such as risk, imperfect information and transaction cost have a meaningful role to play” (p. 4).  Giannini’s chronological account takes off from the “intermingling of money and credit,” brought about by banks against the background of capitalism and the rise of the democratic state,

which “set in motion a long and somewhat tortuous process of institutional adaptation centred around the figure of the central bank.  To date, the process has consisted in three separate phases.”

The first, ending in 1844, saw convertible bank notes; the second saw the recognition of the problem of how to govern bank money, and also central banks as lenders of last resort and bank regulators; the third

saw inconvertible “managed” money, that is, modern monetary policy which meant the nationalization of the central banks (p. xxvii).  “All the major monetary innovations have taken place during a sharp growth in trade, particularly international trade” (p. 19).

“For every payment technology there must … be a body of rules, conventions and institutional mechanisms designed to sustain the confidence of the people using it” (p. 9).  The institutionalist approach to its analysis puts trust at its center.  This is where central banks come in.  The book gives examples from “Fluctuations of Trust: Pre-industrial Credit Payment Technologies” in Chapter 2 through “International Money: Building Trust in an Underinstitutionalized Environment,” characterized by the breakdown of

Bretton Woods, in Chapter 6.

Giannini paints a bleak picture of the future of central banking, that is, of their capacity to provide confidence in the payments system. He quotes Bank of England Governor (1920-44) Montagu Norman to the effect that “No central bank can be greater than its own State – the creature greater than the creator.”  The internationalism of bank money is unlikely “because the banking system is … protected by a safety net that is the responsibility of the nation-state and, ultimately, of local taxpayers” (p. 218).   On the other hand, central banks pursuing national goals at the expense of others are unlikely to produce a healthy international environment.  A solution in the form of cooperation between sovereign states is problematic.  Perhaps, “in the long term … this problem will produce a strong incentive to share monetary sovereignty on a regional basis and in some cases to look for a new territorialization of money on a broader geographical scale, through the creation of innovative forms of political action” (p. 218).

“In the years to come [as often in the past], the most interesting developments will probably be precisely in the sphere of supervision and regulation” (p. 255).  However, moral hazard problems, always present, as in the lender of last resort, are growing.  “Globalization has sharply increased financial concentration, [creating] national champions far out of proportion with the rest of the economy and even the central bank.  This was predicted by Fred Hirsch [“The Bagehot Problem,” Manchester School, 1957] in the little-known article that marked the start of modern studies of central banking.    [G]iven informational asymmetries the attempt to subject banking to strict market discipline would result in concentration, as large banks sought the protective umbrella of government” (p. 257).

The increased activity of central banks since the middle of the last decade is consistent with Giannini’s logic of the evolution of central banks.  The problem of inflation seems to have been solved but the greater function of central banks, that of supplying trust in the payments system, has a murky future.  Those who hope to predict or understand the next step would do well to begin with the book under

review.

John H. Wood, Wake Forest University, is author of A History of Central Banking in Great Britain and the United States (Cambridge University Press, 2005).

Copyright (c) 2012 by EH.Net. All rights reserved. This work may be copied for non-profit educational uses if proper credit is given to the author and the list. For other permission, please contact the EH.Net Administrator (administrator@eh.net). Published by EH.Net (February 2012). All EH.Net reviews are archived at http://www.eh.net/BookReview.

Geographic Location: General, International, or Comparative Subject: Financial Markets, Financial Institutions, and Monetary History Time: 19th Century, 20th Century: Pre WWII, 20th Century: WWII and post-WWI