Introduction Keir Starmer’s desire for a re-set of the UK’s relationship with the EU has ceased to be a two-dimensional, bilateral discussion with EU negotiators. It has become a four-dimensional…
Bob Lyddon
Introduction The European Central Bank (ECB) issued its 2024 annual report on 20th February and revealed that it now has negative capital.1 What with the German elections delivering a stalemate,…
Keir Starmer wants to ‘re-set’ the UK’s relationship with the EU – but on what?
Introduction Keir Starmer, the UK’s Prime Minister, wants a ‘re-set’ in the UK’s relations with the EU. About what? Starmer has said that he cannot envisage the UK rejoining either…
Introduction The measures taken by the UK’s Labour Party since taking office in July 2024 will appear bizarre to most economists. They are based on a cluster of theories that…
China admits it has massive shadow debts – creating a headache for the EU and UK, and a threat to their public credit ratings
Introduction The stimulus package for the Chinese economy, presaged by the People’s Bank of China in late September, has disappointed in its size and detail, but it has achieved something…
China’s loosening of monetary policy is so small it could be missed but it both apes the mistakes of other central banks, and breaks the global agreements it has made with them
Introduction In September, the Chinese authorities announced a package of measures to stop the fall in real estate prices, encourage investment in assets other than real estate, and bolster share…
Economic indicators are confused – but a ‘soft landing’ looks less likely than a few months ago
Introduction Governments and central banks have pinned a lot of their credibility on returning the world economy, after the Pandemic and the inflation shock, to an orderly picture of inflation…
There is no European Financial Safety Net, and therefore no Global Financial Safety Net
Introduction Financial regulators frequently refer to the Global Financial Safety Net, or GFSN, as the bulwark against a repeat of the Global Financial Crisis and the Eurozone crisis 2007-13. The…
Introduction Financial regulators and governments have made much of their success in restoring the global financial system to a state of stability after the Global Financial Crisis and the Eurozone…
Government interventions and over-borrowing have prepared the way for a re-run of the Global Financial Crisis
Introduction We recently wrote that the enormous losses being handed to taxpayers by Western central banks were in effect the second part of the same bill for the Global Financial…