Ex post dangers are inversely correlated to ex ante perceptions of risk.

Sir, Stephen King writes: “One of the main “costs” of global economic success… is excessive risk taking. Put simply, the good times don’t tend to last because we start to do stupid things that bring them to an end. Until the equity market wobbles in early February, most investors appeared to be as complacent about potential risk as they had been ahead of the crisis.” “Global good times make the world act stupidly” March 9.

Is that really excessive risk taking, or is not more a belief that there is little risk?

It is surprising how much ex post dangers get to be confounded with ex ante perceptions of risk.

The most dramatic example of that are the bank regulators who, in Basel II, assigned a risk weight of 150% to the below BB- rated, that which everyone knows is risky, and only of 20% to the AAA rated, that which everyone can so dangerously believe is very safe?

That our banks have landed in the hands of such mentally feeble minds as those of the Basel Committee, is indeed a tragedy.

http://perkurowski.blogspot.com/2016/04/here-are-17-reasons-for-why-i-believe.html

Per Kurowski

Janet Yellen, Mario Draghi, ask IBM’s Watson what algorithms he would feed robobankers, to make these useful and safe

Sir, Sam Fleming reporting from Jackson Hole writes “Janet Yellen, the Federal Reserve chair said regulatory reforms pushed through after the great financial crisis had made the system “substantially safer” and were not weighing on growth or lending. … If the lessons of the last crisis were remembered “we have reason to hope that the financial system and economy will experience fewer crises and recover from any future crisis more quickly”, “Yellen warns opponents of tighter financial rules to remember lessons of crisis” August 26.

As I see it Yellen has not yet learned at all that past and future financial crisis have not, nor will ever, result from excessive exposures to what was or is perceived as risky, these will always result from unexpected events, like when that was perceived, decreed or concocted as very safe, turned out ex post to be very risky.

Since regulators do not to want listen to anything else but their own mutual admiration net-works’ risk biases, I wish they would contract IBM’s neutral Watson to ask it the following:

Watson, while considering the purpose of banks as well as the real dangers to our financial systems, what algorithms would you suggest feeding robobankers with?

THEN Yellen, Draghi and colleagues should compare that algorithm with what they are feeding the human bankers with; the portfolio invariant risk weighted capital requirements that assumes that bankers do not see or clear for risks by means of size of exposure and risk premiums charged.

Then these regulators would understand that with their over-the-board incentives for banks to invest or lend to what is safe, like AAA rated securities and sovereigns, like Greece, they are in fact creating those conditions that dooms banks to suffer huge crises, sooner or later, over and over.

Then these regulators would understand that their regulations induce banks to stay away way too much from lending to what is perceived risky, like SMEs and entrepreneurs, something which clearly must weigh heavy against the prospects of our real economy to growth.

Janet Yellen, Mario Draghi, please ask Watson! Perhaps you could find him on LinkedIn 😆

@PerKurowski

Basel rules favor building “safe” basements for children to live with parents over financing “risky” job creation

Sir, Chris Watling writes “High house prices contribute to one of society’s great divides: that is between the haves and the have nots; between the older property-owning generation and younger renters unable to get on to the property ladder… Banks [when financing houses] now require substantially less capital than would have been required before Basel I and one-eighth of the capital required versus a corporate loan.” “Blame Basel capital rules for the UK’s house price bonanza” June 15.

Absolutely! The Basel Committee’s risk weighted capital requirements helps finance the “safe” basements where kids without jobs can live with their parents, but not the “risky” SMEs or entrepreneurs that could give the kids the jobs that could help them afford to buy a house… and less so at the current high credit inflated prices of houses.

How many letters have I written to you about the distortions in the allocation of bank credit to the real economy these regulations cause? Here are just some quite similar to this one. http://teawithft.blogspot.com/search/label/basements

Sir, you define yourself as “Without fear and without favour”… but the way you have silenced my arguments, only shows you running scared by some of your prima donnas with weak egos.

@PerKurowski

P.S. Washington Post. December 2018: “Affordable homes or houses as investment/retirement assets?”

FT, is not withholding truths, for any reasons of your own, as fake, as fake news pushed for any reasons of its own?

Sir, I refer to Tim Harford’s “Hard truths about fake news”, March 4.

Given the fact that juicy/irrelevant or fake news/stories are usually so much more “interesting” for readers (like Harford and I) than many real fact based news/stories, Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg clearly faces a tremendous conflict on interests. That of course because Facebook makes most (if not perhaps all of its income) when its users (like Harford and I) click on the ads attracted by these juicy/fake stories/news.

But is Harford someone to discuss this matters as an outsider? He writes in the Financial Times, and one of the greatest true financial real horror stories/news ever, must be about how bank regulators could get it so wrong so as to in Basel II assign a tiny 20% risk weight for what is so dangerous for the banking system, the AAA rated, and a huge 150% risk weight to the totally innocuous below BB- rated. But, has FT picked up on that? No! 

Because of some unexplained internal reasons FT knows best of, notwithstanding my soon 2.500 letters on subprime banking regulations, notwithstanding its motto of “without fear and without favour”, FT has kept mum on that story.

Sir, is not withholding truths, for any reasons of your own, just as fake as fake news pushed for commercial, political or any other reasons of its own? 

PS. Harford writes: “as a loyal FT columnist, I need hardly point out that the perfect newspaper is the one you’re reading right now”. That is an interesting point, which begs the question: Is columnists’ loyalty to their own newspaper something crucial for good journalism or good newspapers?

PS. Harford writes: “Reading the same newspaper every day is a filter bubble too.” Oops, careful there Tim, you are entering into the very delicate theme of groupthink and intellectual incest.

@PerKurowski

If only regulators had had one of those “what-to-do” algorithms Tim Harford mentions before regulating banks.

Sir, Tim Harford refers to Brian Christian’s and Tom Griffiths’ “Algorithms to Live By” in order to ask: “Can computer scientists –– help us to solve human problems such as having too many things to do, and not enough time in which to do them? He concludes “It’s an appealing idea to any economist”, among others because “Computers practise ‘interrupt coalescing’, or lumping little tasks together. A shopping list helps to prevent unnecessary return trips to the shop.” “An algorithm for getting through your to-do list” August 6.

How I wish the bank regulators had had access to such algorithms and to the lumping together of all their, not that small, but huge necessary tasks.

If so, they would have been remembered to define the purpose of the banks, among which is the need to allocate credit efficiently to the real economy stands out, and so they would have stayed away from their distortive risk weighted capital requirements.

If so, they would have remembered to read some books on past crises, or looked into some empirical data, and thereby have understood that bank crises are never ever caused by excessive exposures to something perceived as risky, but always from excessive exposures to something perceived as very safe when put on the balance sheet, and so they would have know their risk-weighted capital requirements were 180 degrees off target.

@PerKurowski ©