At its meeting on 26 October, the eurozone countries agreed on a deal to tackle the three problems identified in Part A of this blog:
1. Making the Greek debt burden sustainable
2. Increasing the size of the eurozone bailout fund to persuade markets that there would be sufficient funding to support other eurozone countries which were having difficulties in servicing their debt.
3. Recapitalising various European banks to shield them against possible losses from haircuts and defaults.
The following were agreed:
1. Banks would be required to take a loss of 50% in converting existing Greek bonds into new ones. This swap will take place in January 2012. Note that Greek debt to other countries and the ECB would be unaffected and thus total Greek debt would be cut by considerably less than 50%.
2. The bailout fund (EFSF) would increase to between €1 trillion and €1.4 trillion, although this would be achieved not by direct contributions by Member States or the ECB, but by encouraging non-eurozone countries (such as China, Russia, India and Brazil) to buy eurozone debt in return for risk insurance. These purchases would the form the base on which the size of the fund could be multiplied (leveraged). There would also be backing from the IMF. Details would be firmed up in November.
3. Recapitalising various European banks to shield them against possible losses from haircuts and defaults. About 70 banks will be required to raise an additional €106.4 billion by increasing their Tier 1 capital ratio by 9% by June 2012 (this compares with the Basel III requirement of 6% Tier 1 by 2015).
On the longer-term issue of closer fiscal union, the agreement was in favour of achieving this, along with tight constraints on the levels of government deficits and debt – a return to something akin to the Stability and Growth Pact.
On the issue of economic growth, whilst constraining sovereign debt may be an important element of a long-term growth strategy, the agreement has not got to grips with the short-term problem of a lack of aggregate demand – unless, of course, the relief in markets at seeing a solution to the debt problem may boost business and consumer confidence. This, in turn, may provide the boost to aggregate demand that has been sadly lacking over the past few months.
Certainly if the reaction of stock markets around the world are anything to go by, the recovery in confidence may be under way. The day following the agreement, the German stock market index, the Dax, rose by 6.3% and the French Cac index rose by 5.4%.
Articles
Eurozone crisis explained BBC News (27/10/11)
Leaders agree eurozone debt plan in Brussels BBC News, Matthew Price (27/10/11)
Eurozone agreement – the detail BBC News, Hugh Pym (27/10/11)
10 key questions on the eurozone bailout Citywire Money, Caelainn Barr (27/10/11)
European debt crisis: ‘Europe is going to have a very tough winter’ – video analysis Guardian, Larry Elliott (27/10/11)
Eurozone crisis: banks agree 50% reduction on Greece’s debt Guardian, David Gow (27/10/11)
The euro deal: No big bazooka The Economist (29/10/11)
Europe’s rescue plan The Economist (29/10/11)
European banks given just eight months to raise €106bn The Telegraph, Louise Armitstead (26/10/11)
EU reaches agreement on Greek bonds Financial Times, Peter Spiegel, Stanley Pignal and Alex Barker (27/10/11)
Unlike politicians, the markets are seeing sense Independent, Hamish McRae (27/10/11)
Market view: Eurozone rescue deal buys time FT Adviser, Michael Trudeau (27/10/11)
Greece vows to build on EU deal, people sceptical Reuters, Renee Maltezou and Daniel Flynn (27/10/11)
Markets boosted by eurozone deal Independent, Peter Cripps, Jamie Grierson (27/10/11)
Has Germany been prudent or short-sighted? BBC News blogs, Robert Peston (27/10/11)
Germany’s Fiscal union with a capital F BBC News blogs, Stephanie Flanders (27/10/11)
Questions
- What are the key features of the deal reached in Brussels on 26 October?
- What details still need to be worked out?
- How will the EFSF be boosted some 4 or 5 times without extra contributions fron eurozone governments?
- Why, if banks are to take a 50% haircut on their holdings of Greek debt, will Greek debt fall only to 120% per cent by 2020 from just over 160% currently?
- On balance, is this a good deal?
As European leaders gather for an emergency summit in Brussels to tackle the eurozone debt crisis, we consider the issues and possible solutions. In Part B we’ll consider the actual agreement.
There are three key short-term issues that the leaders are addressing.
1. The problem of Greek debt
With fears that the Greek debt crisis could spread to other eurozone countries, such as Italy and Spain, it is vital to have a solution to the unsustainability of Greek debt. Either banks must be willing to write off a proportion of Greek debt owed to them or governments must give a fiscal transfer to Greece to allow it to continue servicing the debt. Simply lending Greece even more provides no long-term solution as this will simply make the debt even harder to service. Writing off a given percentage of debt is known as a ‘haircut’. The haircut on offer before the summit was 21%. Leaders are reportedly considering increasing this to around 60%.
2. The size of the eurozone bailout fund
The bailout fund, the European Financial Stability Facility (EFSF), stood at €440 billion. This is considered totally inadequate to provide loans to Italy and Spain, should they need a bailout. France and other countries want the ECB to provide extra loans to the EFSF, to increase its funds to somewhere between €2 trillion and €3 trillion. Germany before the meeting was strongly against this, seeing it as undermining the rectitude of the ECB. A compromise would be for the EFSF to provide partial guarantees to investors and banks which are willing to lend more to countries in debt crisis.
3. Recapitalising various European banks
Several European banks are heavily exposed to sovereign debt in countries such as Greece, Italy and Spain. It is estimated that they would need to raise an extra €100 billion to shield them against possible losses from haircuts and defaults.
But there is the key longer-term issue as well.
Achieving long-term economic growth
Without economic growth, debt servicing becomes much more difficult. The austerity measures imposed on highly indebted countries amount to strongly contractionary fiscal policies, as government expenditure is cut and taxes are increased. But as the economies contract, so automatic fiscal stabilisers come into play. As incomes and expenditure decline, so people pay less income tax and less VAT and other expenditure taxes; as incomes decline and unemployment rises, so government welfare payments and payments of unemployment benefits increase. These compound public-sector deficits and bring the possibility of even stronger austerity measures. A downward spiral of decline and rising debt can occur.
The answer is more rapid growth. But how is that to be achieved when governments are trying to reduce debt? That is the hardest and ultimately the most important question.
Articles
Brussels summit: the main issues to be resolved The Telegraph (25/10/11)
EU crisis talks in limbo after crucial summit is cancelled The Telegraph, Louise Armitstead (25/10/11)
Euro zone summit likely to give few numbers on crisis response Reuters, Jan Strupczewski (25/10/11)
Factbox: What EU leaders must decide at crisis summit Reuters (24/10/11)
Hopes low ahead of EU summit Euronews on YouTube (25/10/11)
Euro crisis: EU leaders hope to reach debt plan BBC News (26/10/11)
The deadline Europe cannot afford to miss BBC News, Nigel Cassidy (26/10/11)
Why EU summit is crunch day for the eurozone BBC News, Paul Mason (26/10/11)
Southern European banks need most capital BBC News blogs, Robert Peston (23/10/11)
Will Germany insure Italy against default? BBC News blogs, Robert Peston (26/10/11)
Plan B for the eurozone? BBC News blogs, Stephanie Flanders (26/10/11)
‘No such thing as Europe’ BBC Today Programme, Stephanie Flanders and Martin Wolf (26/10/11)
Markets to eurozone: It’s the growth, stupid BBC News blogs, Stephanie Flanders (24/10/11)
Fears euro summit could miss final deal Financial Times, Peter Spiegel, Gerrit Wiesmann and Matt Steinglass (26/10/11)
Time to unleash financial firepower or face euro breakup Guardian, Larry Elliott (25/10/11)
The Business podcast: eurozone crisis Guardian, Larry Elliott, David Gow and Jill Treanor (25/10/11)
Why is Germany refusing to budge on the eurozone debt crisis? Guardian blogs, Phillip Inman (26/10/11)
Questions
- In terms of the three short-term problems identified above, compare alternative measures for dealing with each one.
- To what extent would the ECB creating enough money to recapitalise European banks be inflationary? On what factors does this depend?
- Does bailing out countries create a moral hazard? Explain.
- What possible ways are there of achieving economic growth while reducing countries sovereign debt?
- Would you agree that the problem facing eurozone countries at the moment is more of a political one than an economic one? Explain.
- What are the arguments for and against greater fiscal integration in the eurozone?
The global economic mood is darkening. Levels of consumer and producer confidence have declined and forecasts of economic growth are being downgraded. Mervyn King, Governor of the Bank of England, stated that “this is the most serious financial crisis we’ve seen, at least since the 1930s, if not ever” (see).
So will slow recovery turn into a second recession (a double-dip)? And will recession turn into depression – the persistence of low or negative growth over a number of years? The following articles consider this frightening prospect and whether there are similarities with the Great Depression of the 1930s.
But let’s not be too downhearted. If we all are, the world could end up talking itself into depression. Consumers would seek to claw down their debts and cut back spending; producers would invest less as their confidence wanes; banks would be unwilling to lend. So is there any cause to be cheerful? Well, at least world leaders are increasingly aware of the possibility of world depression and minds are increasingly being focused on how to avoid the situation. The EU summit on 23 October and the G20 summit in Cannes on 3/4 November have EU sovereign debt problems and the global crisis at the centre of their agenda.
But if they do decide to act, what should they do? Is the answer a Keynesian stimulus to aggregate demand through fiscal policy and through further quantitative easing? Or is the approach to act more decisively to reduce sovereign debt and convince markets that governments are serious about tackling the problem – a policy response much more in accordance with new classical thinking and the type of policy that would be recommended by Thomas Sargent and Christopher Sims, winners of this year’s Nobel Prize in Economics?
Thinking outside the 1930s box BBC News blogs, Paul Mason (7/10/11)
Britain faces slowest recovery in a century Guardian, Katie Allen (12/10/11)
The Depression: If Only Things Were That Good New York Times, Sunday Review, David Leonhardt (8/10/11)
Recovery has ‘stalled’, say leading economists Financial Times, Sarah O’Connor (11/10/11)
Nobel prize in economics Republica, Opinion (Nepal), Sukhdev Shah (11/10/11)
Questions
- In what ways is the current global economic situation similar to that in the early 1930s?
- In what ways is it different? Do these differences provide more or less cause for hope for avoiding a global depression?
- Explain the following quote from the first article above: “I think that we face the quite real prospect that the market is removed as the determining mechanism for setting the price of capital within the eurozone at the sovereign level.This would put internal credit creation back under the control of the state.”
- How is the supply side of the economy relevant to (a) the short-run prospects for economic growth; (b) the long-run prospects?
- If technological progess slows down, what will be the implications for employment and unemployment? Explain.
- How is policy credibility relevant to the success of the decisions made at G20 and EU summits? (See last aricle above.) How would a Keynesian respond to the analysis of Sargent and Sims?
With economic growth in the UK stalling and growing alarm about the state of the world economy, the Bank of England has announced a second round of quantitative easing (QE2). This will involve the Bank buying an extra £75 billion of government bonds (gilts) in the market over the following four months. This is over and above the nearly £200 billion of assets, mainly gilts, purchased in the first round of quantitative easing in 2009/10. The purchase will release extra (narrow) money into the economy. Hopefully, this will then allow more credit to be created and the money multiplier to come into play, thereby increasing broad money by a multiple of the £75 billion.
In his letter to the Chancellor of the Exchequer seeking permission for QE2, the Governor stated:
In the United Kingdom, the path of output has been affected by a number of temporary factors, but the available indicators suggest that the underlying rate of growth has also moderated. The squeeze on households’ real incomes and the fiscal consolidation are likely to continue to weigh on domestic spending, while the strains in bank funding markets may also inhibit the availability of credit to consumers and businesses. While the stimulatory monetary stance and the present level of sterling should help to support demand, the weaker outlook for, and the increased downside risks to, output growth mean that the margin of slack in the economy is likely to be greater and more persistent than previously expected.
… The deterioration in the outlook has made it more likely that inflation will undershoot the 2% target in the medium term. In the light of that shift in the balance of risks, and in order to keep inflation on track to meet the target over the medium term, the Committee judged that it was necessary to inject further monetary stimulus into the economy.
But will increasing the money supply lead to increased aggregate demand, or will the money simply sit in banks, thereby increasing their liquidity ratio, but not resulting in any significant increase in spending? In other words, in the equation MV = PY, will the rise in M simply result in a fall in V with little effect on PY? And even if it does lead to a rise in PY, will it be real national income (Y) that rises, or will the rise in MV simply be absorbed in higher prices (P)?
According to a recent article published in the Bank of England’s Quarterly Bulletin, The United Kingdom’s quantitative easing policy: design, operation and impact, the £200 billion of asset purchases under QE1 led to a rise in real GDP of about 2%. If QE2 has the same proportionate effect, real GDP could be expected to rise by about 0.75%. But some commentators argue that things are different this time and that the effect could be much smaller. The following articles examine what is likely to happen. They also look at one of the side-effects of the policy – the reduction in the value of pensions as the policy drives down long-term gilt yields and long-term interest rates generally.
Articles
Bank of England launches second round of QE Interactive Investor, Sarah Modlock (6/10/11)
Britain in grip of worst ever financial crisis, Bank of England governor fears Guardian, Larry Elliott and Katie Allen (6/10/11)
Interview with a Governor BBC News, Stephanie Flanders interviews Mervyn King (6/10/11)
The meaning of QE2 BBC News, Stephanie Flanders (6/10/11)
Bank of England’s MPC united over quantitative easing BBC News (19/10/11)
Bank of England’s QE2 may reach £500bn, economists warn The Telegraph, Philip Aldrick (6/10/11)
‘Shock and awe’ may be QE’s biggest asset The Telegraph, Philip Aldrick (6/10/11)
Quantitative easing by the Bank of England: printing more money won’t work this time The Telegraph, Andrew Lilico (6/10/11)
BOE launches QE2 with 75 billion pound boost Reuters, various commentators (6/10/11)
Shock and awe from Bank of England Financial Times, Chris Giles (6/10/11)
More QE: Full reaction Guardian, various commentators (6/10/11)
Quantitative easing warning over pension schemes Guardian, Jill Insley (6/10/11)
Pension schemes warn of QE2 Titanic disaster Mindful money (6/10/11)
Calm down Mervyn – this so-called global recession is really not that bad Independent, Hamish McRae (9/10/11)
Bank of England publications
Asset Purchase Facility: Gilt Purchases Bank of England Market Notice (6/10/11)
Governor’s ITN interview (6/10/11)
Bank of England Maintains Bank Rate at 0.5% and Increases Size of Asset Purchase Programme by £75 billion to £275 billion Bank of England News Release (6/10/11)
Quantitative Easing – How it Works
Governor’s letter to the Chancellor (6/10/11)
Chancellor’s reply to the Governor (6/10/11)
Minutes of the Monetary Policy Committee meeting, 5 and 6 October 2011 (19/10/11)
Inflation Report
Quarterly Bulletin (2011, Q3)
Questions
- Explain how quantitative easing works.
- What is likely to determine its effectiveness in stimulating the economy?
- Why does the Bank of England prefer to inject new money into the economy by purchasing gilts rather than by some other means that might directly help small business?
- Explain how QE2 is likely to affect pensions.
- What will determine whether QE2 will be inflationary?
- Why is the perception of the likely effectiveness of QE2 one of the key determinants of its actual effectiveness?
The following podcast from the BBC Radio 4’s series, A Point of View is by John Gray, emeritus professor of European thought at the LSE and author of False Dawn: The Delusions of Global Capitalism. In the podcast, he considers whether Marx, the great 19th century thinker, was right to predict the demise of capitalism.
Marx’s picture of the end of capitalism and the stages of society that would succeed it have been dismissed by most academics and commentators as quite false. Marx predicted that as capitalist economies became increasingly unstable and unequal, so workers would rise up in revolution. What would follow would be a socialist state in which the means of production would be collectively owned and output and distribution would be planned. As socialist economies became wealthier and life was perceived to be fairer, so the need for state control would diminish. Eventually the state would wither away and the ultimate stage of communism would be reached, where there would sufficient resources to reward everyone according to their needs.
Two of the key criticisms of Marx’s analysis are: (a) capitalism was overthrown in only a few countries and (b) in the countries that did adopt central planning, such as the Soviet Union and Eastern European countries, the state did not wither away; instead, they reverted to capitalism.
But whilst Marx’s analysis of a post-capitalist world may have been flawed, his analysis of the weaknesses and tensions of capitalism have been prophetically correct in many regards. As John Gray says:
It’s not just capitalism’s endemic instability that he understood, though in this regard he was far more perceptive than most economists in his day and ours.
More profoundly, Marx understood how capitalism destroys its own social base – the middle-class way of life. The Marxist terminology of bourgeois and proletarian has an archaic ring.
But when he argued that capitalism would plunge the middle classes into something like the precarious existence of the hard-pressed workers of his time, Marx anticipated a change in the way we live that we’re only now struggling to cope with.
Listen to the podcast and try to assess whether we are witnessing a 21st century version of Marx’s 19th century vision.
A Point of View: The revolution of capitalism (article) BBC Radio 4, John Gray (4/9/11)
A Point of View: The revolution of capitalism (podcast) BBC Radio 4, John Gray (4/9/11) (see alternatively)
Has Western capitalism failed? BBC News (23/9/11)
Questions
- Why, according to Marx, do capitalist societies contain the seeds of their own destruction? What role would the middle classes play in this?
- Why does capitalism transform everything it touches?
- Explain what is meant by ‘creative destruction’.
- How would Marxists respond to the criticisms of their analysis that the middle classes have got proportionately bigger and that, with the advent of the minimum wage, even the poorest workers are protected?
- To what extent has the experience of the developed world since the banking crisis of 2007/8 lent weight to the Marxist analysis?
- John Gray says that “Today there is no haven of security.” What does he mean by this and is there an answer within capitalism?
- And here’s a hard question to finish with: if capitalism does contain the seeds of its own destruction, what will succeed it? Will it be something other than capitalism and, if so, what? Or will it be a new variety of capitalism and, if so, what will it look like?