Down, down, down, down

Thursday 20 November 2008 - Down, down, down, down

Presented by Paul Donovan




+ Japan's exports are down, in particular to Asia, signalling that global demand is down further. The numbers give downside risk to GDP estimates, as exports (and export revenue funded investment programs) were pretty important to Japanese growth.


+ The Bank of England's Gieve indicates that the risks for UK interest rates are very definitely down, as the medium term risks for the inflation outlook are also down. This is consistent with the BoE minutes indicating that the committee debated taking rates down further at their last meeting.


+ The Fed minutes indicated that growth and inflation expectations have come down (clearly some Fed members fear deflation). Quantitative easing was discussed as a possible policy prescription for the future (rather than a current policy action).


+ The ECB meets, though with little prospect that they will take rates down now (that would require the council members to live in the real word). Der Spiegel has suggested that the EU may offer a EUR130bn fiscal stimulus, though that would require cooperation, which has been noticeably lacking recently.

Category:

News & Politics

Tags:

• ubs
• economics
• paul
• donovan
• credit
• financial
• markets
• crisis
• down
• japan
• ecb
• rates
• forecast
• demand
• boe
• inflation
• growth
• quantitative
• easing
• deflation

[waldentree]

quite right about the ECB

raising interest rates was crazy

[hwy9nightkid]

this guy cracks me up with his humanizing approach to economic news.

I'll be keeping my head down, but still opening my business.

[fishingthewatershed]

Good commentary, very informative.