April 30, 2007

Please, pick the cherries!

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Sir, Andrew Jack reports that “World Bank agency seeks to create African health funds” April 30, and that one concern about one of its agenc...
April 27, 2007

How much does blissful ignorance has to do with our current financial bliss?

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Sir in your editorial comment “Securitised stability”, April 27 you mention that “there are benefits from dispersing credit risks across the...
April 26, 2007

Thanks, that was much needed!

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Sir, our problems on planet earth are just too serious to allow us from not spelling out some uncomfortable truths. In this respect, with y...

One little raffle would do it

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Sir, Barney Jopson in “Unknown auditor? Not in my back yard, thank you” describes how though everyone knows it is not good for the markets t...

We need some new derivatives!

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Sir, Paul J Davies reports that Moody’s warns on change of control clause”, April 26, with respect to a clause that is supposed to protect t...
April 25, 2007

Do not tax the migrants, make them save instead.

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Sir, I could not agree more with Philippe Legrain on that Europe (and the US) need urgently to develop some large scale temporary immigratio...
April 24, 2007

Brands are brands and that’s the way it is!

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Sir, of course brands are useful when they motivate you to keep the name of the Financial Times in good standing, and me to do the same with...
April 23, 2007

The World Bank, though in a hole, needs to dig deeper

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Sir, as a former Executive Director of the World Bank (2002-2004) it is with much sadness that I have followed the Wolfowitz affair. It is c...

The pastor risk is the risk that investors just share into blissful ignorance.

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Sir, Wolfgang Münchau is correct when saying “A risk shared may be more risky, not less”, April 23. As arguments he presents, first the dece...

How to get someone else’s grandson to take care of you when you are old?

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Sir, Michiyo Nakamoto reports “Japan requires age-old wisdom on problems of productivity” April 23, on how a country of saver “who have long...
April 20, 2007

The public private matrix

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Sir, strange how terms could seem to evolve! I say this because when reading the title of Gillian Tett’s article “Multi-layered finance a de...
April 18, 2007

A rescue plan for the subprime mortgage blow-up

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Sir, Desmond Lachman in “Housing bubble burst into American elections”, April 18, paints a very sombre picture that is just made much worse ...

Easy stuff!

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Sir, the sequencing of economics often creates confusion. For a normal person, if the US core inflations slows down, April 18, that sounds g...
April 17, 2007

Should we then go after the intellectual perpetrators?

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Sir, John Dizard in “A reform unlikely to dent rating agencies’ armour”, April 17, mentions that the credit rating agencies believe they are...
April 16, 2007

The world needs the cleansing and energizing forces of volatility

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Sir, Tim Young in his letter on “How Japan’s investment was paralyzed”, April 16, asks the very relevant question “whether the cumulative lo...
April 15, 2007

It is more of a wondrous world!

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Sir, “when on April 12 you wrote that “The IMF reports on a wonderful world” the adjective wondrous could have been more appropriate. IMF, i...
April 14, 2007

Distraction from destruction?

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Sir, in the Global Financial Stability Report prepared by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) for their meetings in April in Washington we...
April 13, 2007

The problem with the sub-prime mortgages is just the tip of an iceberg.

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Sir, Gillian Tett when saying that “Subprime proposals could broaden litigation risk all around”, April 13, she mentions at risk those who o...

Are there triple standards too?

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Sir, I have just sat through a two day seminar in Washington organized by the World Bank Institute on the “Effects of mass media on public p...
April 12, 2007

What an opportunity we seem to have missed!

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Sir, Daniel Smith writes that “Politicians cannot control Nigeria’s corruption crusade”, April 12, and of course he is right, since absolute...
April 11, 2007

What about all the rents that go to the intellectual property rights?

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Sir, Martin Wolf in “Employment policies can ensure a fair share of the feast”, April 11, when commenting on the declining shares of labour ...

Withdrawal to where?

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Sir, you are right about there being “No easy route to an Iraq withdrawal” April 11, but one of the main reasons for that is perhaps that th...
April 05, 2007

Let us not waste this opportunity to make a very significant reform at the World Bank

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Sir, on the web of World Bank (WB) we find an interview with Suzanne Rich Folsom the Director of the World Bank's Department of Institut...

Our valuable reservoirs of gullibility

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Sir, can you imagine if we were not able or allowed to be gullible? What an awfully boring world it would be, drowned in rationality without...

Does Le Pen want a patent?

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Sir, once when reading an analysis of the cash flows derived from the sale of a music CD went, I was surprised to see how much went to the r...

How are the fines split?

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Sir, Patti Waldmeir starts of very well with “Bribery is not just a cost of doing business”, April 5, but then it sort of fizzles out in som...
April 04, 2007

A spaghetti bowl might give more jobs… to some

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Sir, Martin Wolf makes a splendid case for how the free trade reforms could be handled better than when “ A Korean-American strand enters t...

Bank needs products

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eSir, your “Bank seeks customers”, April 4, in which you describe the headaches of someone who is losing a valuable market niche, in this ca...
April 03, 2007

Sorry I must have done something terribly wrong!

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Sir, yesterday I suddenly received a pop-up in my computer informing me that since I had sent one same message on one same day to 500 recipi...
April 02, 2007

The mother of all systemic risks

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Sir, when Richard Beales reports (April 2) that “Uproar forces Moody’s into U-turn over bank ratings” he gives compelling evidence to what s...

Don’t cry for the bank regulators

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Sir, Wolfgang Munchau in “Cross-border banks require a single regulator” (April 2) explains that this is now becoming a European Unions issu...
March 31, 2007

Bewildered

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Sir I was a bit disoriented by the title of Christopher Caldwell’s “Harsh policing goes transatlantic”, March 31, since it caused me to star...
March 30, 2007

Incest and irony

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Sir, by reading your “ CPDOs add more complexity ”, March 30, that states “The rating agencies are key to creating the [financial] products...

Help the migrants to earn more and not to forget their mothers

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Sir, the Inter-American Development Bank informed that the remittances sent home to the Latin American countries by their migrant workers in...
March 29, 2007

Why not just go to the sidelines first?

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New York Times , I am a foreigner, but since what America does mean more for the world than the famous butterfly flapping its wings, I hope ...
March 25, 2007

Viva Wall Street!

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In the Washington Post of March 25 Lyla Ward, in “Who needs a fence? Viva Mexico, USA!” suggests that the USA should simply go ahead and ac...
March 24, 2007

Calling all the faults, and then some, should only improve his chances!

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A referee, anxious about not destroying his chances with a gorgeous female basketball player by calling her fouls, but that admits to the mo...

Is Caldwell singing praise Graham Nash's Prison Song?

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I always read Christopher Caldwell with much interest but, this time, his “Financial crime and punishment” March 24, leaves me quite at loss...
March 22, 2007

Would Jack Bauer be a good president?

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Sir, although Jacob Weisberg’s much fun “How to tell a killer from a future president”, March 22, might no be that saloon-clean article you ...
March 20, 2007

Different types of sacrifices can solve the entitlement crisis. How about an ättestupa?

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Sir, Peter Peterson concludes his “ Sacrifice can solve the entitlement crisis” March 20, by citing the German theologian Dietrich on the ...

The Protestants and their carbon emission indulgencies

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Sir, Gideon Rachman correctly points out that the issue of global warming could save the union of the European Union but of course it could...
March 19, 2007

Let us pray the estimates are wrong

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Sir, let us pray for that the estimate that 2.2m of American families could lose their homes and that John Gapper mentions in “The wrong way...
March 16, 2007

We need more humility from the bank regulators

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One of the greatest contradictions of our time is how those that say they value the free markets capacity to allocate resources can then so ...
March 08, 2007

But be careful of swinging into just another “patriotically correct version”

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Sir, of course “nations and individuals do not grow weaker by confronting the truth” as Jacob Weisberg argues in his “Iraq: the patrioticall...

The addict and his new sourcerer!

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Sir, Paulo Sotero and Edward Alden wrote about the United States and Brazil “Building a Biofuels Alliance”, Washington Post, March 8 and whi...
March 06, 2007

Should there be resurrection fees?

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Sir, Thomas Rubin is very right in that “Copyright must be respected as culture goes online” March 6, but he sure does sound excruciatingly ...
March 05, 2007

Are there other alternatives than snus?

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Sir, in How Europe can help snuff out smoking John Gapper points in the direction of the Swedish “snus”, a grinded tobacco you place under y...

Divide and conquer?

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Sir, your article “Embattled Wolfowitz seeks more cash”, March 5, personalizes too much the issue, since in reality it is an embattled world...
March 01, 2007

A single line law could be more than just a Band-Aid

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Sir, Jacob Weisberg makes a good description of the “Symptoms of an unsustainable system” that the American healthcare is showing, March 1, ...

Though be careful with any incest

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Sir, in “Such devoted sisters”, March 1, where you discuss the relations between the World Bank and the IMF and sort of imply that it would ...

The World Bank needs urgently its ten best and ten worst list

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Sir, if your child received a grade five in an evaluation but you have no idea whether he was being graded on a scale of 5, 7 or 100, and or...
February 26, 2007

But, whatever you do, let Italy remain being Italy

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Sir, while reading Wolfgang Munchau’s “The last thing Italy needs is the more of the same” February 26, I remembered that some years ago I h...
February 24, 2007

The education of your neighbor’s kids is part of your own kid’s education

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Sir, Mr Manuel Riesco when arguing “Chile’s experience belies claims of those who believe in superiority of private schools”, February 24 is...

Longevity fright 2

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Sir, I can almost hear you ordering to publish Gillian Tett’s and Joanna Chung’s “Death and the salesmen” in the FT-Weekend, February 24, no...

Red lights will not do

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Sir Robert Wright when reporting in “The wrong line from London to Caracas” February 24, about the quid-pro-quos that Ken Livingstone should...

In a state of continued perplexity

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Sir, Christopher Caldwell with his “On parenthood and perplexity”, February 24, leaves us perplexed about the need of the late Anna Nicole ...
February 23, 2007

Vulture funds

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Sir, I write to you with respect to Alan Beattie´s “' Vulture fund' in Zambia debt case gain ”, February 16. I might not like it...
February 21, 2007

It is still the same old petrol though

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Sir, in your editorial comment “Unconventional oil”, February 22, you express some doubts about the quality of oil produced from shale and s...

A mutual admiration club of superheroes?

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Sir, Tom Burgis in “Chávez agrees fuel deal for London poor”, February 21, quotes London’s Mayor Ken Livingstone referring to it as “the wor...
February 17, 2007

We should make sure that the private education incentives are better aligned.

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Sir, while we wholeheartedly agree with your support of “The private role in educating the poorest” February 17, we cannot but observe that ...

The ‛rights of children’ is anything but a juvenile concept.

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Sir, if the average life length of a person in UK were 80 and our democracies had anything to do with representation of interests, as in co...
February 08, 2007

A “Capital Controls for Dummies” could have been handy

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Sir, Kenneth Rogoff illustrates his “No grand plans, but the financial system needs fixing” with some quite hair-raising examples of some un...
February 07, 2007

When in this hole… how should we stop digging?

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Sir, Martin Wolf, “In spite of economic skeptics, it is worth reducing climate risk”, February 7, is absolutely right saying that we should ...

When are business schools really going to make education their business?

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Sir looking at the high tuition fees of many business schools one wonders if they are not setting themselves up to be sued by their graduate...
February 04, 2007

If it is serious then one expects it to be treated seriously too

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Sir, if an illness can be cured by a little pill, that will somehow take away from its perceived seriousness and something similar could be ...

Sometimes we should also beware of the experts

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Sir, in your editorial “Where is all the risk”, February 3, on how financial innovations sometimes come hand in hand with diminishing transp...
January 29, 2007

Should not Higher Education be more of a joint venture?

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Sir, hearing so many young professionals in the USA describing their problems with debts they incurred while studying, I guess that soon so...
January 23, 2007

If only we could share into the loser’s bless

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Sir, John Kay while explaining interestingly why frequently sensible investors willingly exchange very tangible money for unknown financial ...
January 19, 2007

Where have all the bank risks gone?

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Sir, Prof Stella Fearnley, January 22 , reacting over Gillian Tett´s column about the explosion in structured finance (“ The unease bubblin...

We need a carbon-solutions-neutral agency.

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Sir, there seems to be a much growing divergence between the realization of how serious our environmental problems are and the effectiveness...
January 15, 2007

What we really should fear about the green cars is how little we know about them

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Sir, John Gapper writes “Carmakers are turning green with fear” January 15, arguing the dangers for Detroit, GM, Ford and others to sit on t...
January 08, 2007

Which green is best for the environment and our pockets?

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Sir, on January 8 FT carried on the same page stories about GM’s plug-in car and Toyota’s hybrid petrol-electric car, both of which have a m...
January 06, 2007

Two nightmarish possibilities

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Sir, Christopher Caldwell’s brilliant “Youth and war, a deadly duo”, January 6, based on the probably even more brilliant book Söhne und We...
January 05, 2007

On trusting and hacking

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Sir, Benn Steil’s “Digital gold and a flawed global order”, January 5, serves quite well in reminding us about not digging too deep into the...
December 28, 2006

The problem with Marxism is that it does not have an owner like Coca Cola

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Sir, if we look at how globalization like a sunflower that looks for the sun orients its production facilities towards low salary environmen...
December 27, 2006

Valium or placebos?

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Sir, Lawrence Summers with “A lack of fear is cause for concern”, December 27, put his finger where it really hurts since many of us never i...
December 22, 2006

Should we let the market really work the migration flows?

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Sir, I subscribe almost entirely to Martin Wolf’s “Why immigration policy must be a compromise”, December 22, and the almost is there as I f...
December 15, 2006

Should then the ageing population emigrate?

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Sir, Martin Feldstein argues in his “Immigration is no way to fund an ageing population” December 14, that immigration would generate very l...

Thankfully the victims in Darfur do not read FT

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Any poor victim of Darfur’s genocide like killings who might have invested his last few hopes in someone coming from abroad to save him, wou...