Does the ECB have anything left in the locker?
Market expectations about Thursday’s ECB meeting had become quite bullish in the past couple of weeks (see this blog), and Mr Draghi went just far enough to justify those expectations by cutting the...
View ArticleThe dramatic adjustment in eurozone trade imbalances
Martin Wolf’s column on Wednesday and his subsequent blogpost have once again focused attention on the importance of trade flows in the eurozone. Martin’s argument is that the German strategy of fiscal...
View ArticleWhy the ECB is reluctant to “go negative”
The ECB decided yesterday against “going negative” by reducing its deposit rate from zero to -0.25 per cent. The Governing Council again debated the pros and cons of such a measure, which would...
View ArticleGermany is stalling
Tuesday’s extremely weak German industrial production figures published for August have come an awkward time for the German government. An informal “employment conference” including some EU leaders has...
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A critical few weeks for the eurozone
© Hannelore Foerster/Getty Images The markets are waking up to the fact that the euro area faces a critical few weeks in which its economic path for 2015, and maybe for much longer, will be largely...
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Mr Draghi finally delivers
© Hannelore Foerster/Getty Images And then there were none. On Thursday, the European Central Bank became the last of the major central banks to announce a large programme of quantitative easing,...
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The global economy — debate with Wolf and Buiter
© Getty Images This week, I participated in a discussion about the future of the global economy with Martin Wolf and Willem Buiter. The session was at the FT’s Business of Luxury summit in Monaco....
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Firm global growth amid doubts about Chinese data
According to the latest results from Fulcrum’s “nowcast models”, the global economy has continued to perform adequately in July, despite considerable doubts in the financial markets about a possible...
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Global growth bounces back a bit
This is the latest report in our regular monthly series of “nowcasts” for global activity. Global economic data published in November have shown a further uptick in worldwide activity growth after the...
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Global slowdown spreads to the eurozone
Global risk assets have rallied in the last two weeks, encouraged by signs of policy changes in China and the US Federal Reserve, and also by buoyancy in retail sales growth in the US. While this has...
View ArticleIs US inflation (finally) rising?
A few months ago, this blog commented that a rise in inflation in the advanced economies early in 2016 was “almost certain”. Thank goodness for the word “almost”. Since then, oil prices have plumbed...
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Mario Draghi and the ECB learn from experience
Mario Draghi, ECP president © Getty Images Even central bankers can learn from their past mistakes. The package of measures unveiled on Thursday by the European Central Bank is an intelligent response...
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Sims highlights fiscal dominance at Jackson Hole
Professor Christopher Sims © Getty Images The most far reaching speech at the Federal Reserve’s Jackson Hole meeting last week was not the opening address by chairman Janet Yellen, interesting though...
View ArticleGlobal reflation continues into 2017
As the global economy enters 2017, economic growth is running at stronger rates than at any time since 2010, according to Fulcrum’s nowcast models. The latest monthly estimates (attached here) show...
View ArticlePresident Le Pen – small risk, big shock
It has been clear for a while that the most important political risk to global financial markets in 2017 will be the possible election of a President Marine Le Pen in the second round of the French...
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Whatever happened to secular stagnation?
A year ago, Lawrence Summers’ perceptive warnings about the possibility of secular stagnation in the world economy were dominating global markets. China, Japan and the Eurozone were in deflation, and...
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ECB on an even keel — Le Pen permitting
Marine Le Pen © Getty Images The European Central Bank has been one of the two main providers of global monetary easing since 2015, and that seems likely to persist throughout 2017. Despite its...
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What’s driving the global expansion?
In this month’s regular temperature check on global economic activity, the Fulcrum nowcasts identify a continuing strong and co-ordinated global expansion, with no significant signs of any meaningful...
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The ECB is heading towards a dovish exit
Mario Draghi, ECB president © Getty Images For quite a long while, European Central Bank monetary policy has been almost on auto-pilot, but that is about to change. In the September and October...
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Global growth still at record rates for this expansion
The latest monthly reports from the Fulcrum nowcast models of global economic activity show that the growth rate in the world economy is being maintained at the firmest rate recorded since the early...
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