November 30, 2020

12 years since, and yet the true cause of the 2008 crisis shall seemingly not be told

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Sir, John Flint a former Before chief executive of HSBC writes: “Before 2008, regulators’ approach to conduct risk in banking was what they ...
November 24, 2020

FT you have the manpower to analyze how risk weighted bank capital requirements distort the allocation of bank credit.

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Sir, Megan Greene writes: “Stubbornly low interest rates have failed to generate significant aggregate demand. That suggests the world has b...
November 09, 2020

By not asking all the questions that need to be asked, journalists also fail society.

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Sir, Henry Manisty writes “financial journalism plays a vital role in upholding the integrity of financial markets”, “ EU regulators have fo...
October 17, 2020

The most dangerous underlying condition of the US, is that like so many other nations, it has been hit by the Polarization Pandemic.

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Hannah Kuchler writing about her FT lunch with Atul Gawande on the battle to beat Covid-19 , writes: “The US is polarised over its prioriti...
October 16, 2020

Risk taking is the oxygen of all development. God make us daring

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Sir, I refer to Arvind Subramanian’s “Developing economies must not succumb to export pessimism” October 16. In October 2007 at the High-lev...
October 15, 2020

Let’s be very wary of Big Tech and Governments forming Big Brother Joint Ventures

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Marietje Schaake holds that “regulators should be able to assess all sectors for harms done to democracy, using specified skill sets… Empowe...
October 14, 2020

Though meteorologists announce rain, regulators allow banks to operate as if the sun shines.

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Sir, Tommy Stubbington writes: “A coronavirus-linked credit rating downgrade by Fitch prompted speculation that Rome was headed for ‘junk’ t...
September 30, 2020

Where would the City of London be if in the 19th Century it had been placed under the thumb of a Basel Committee?

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Sir, I refer to your “ The City must not be forgotten in Brexit talks ” September 29. In view of the City’s real existential problem, I find...
September 15, 2020

Thou shall not sell environmental crimes indulgences

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Sir, albeit a bit late, I refer to David Sheppard’s Big Read “ Carbon trading: the ‘one-way’ bet for hedge funds ” FT August 23.In his Encyc...
August 15, 2020

Inflation has already returned

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Sir, I refer to your editorial “ The economy is too weak for inflation to return ” August 14, 2020. No! The inflation has alrea...
June 12, 2020

The privileged subsidizing of sovereign debt that apparently shall not be named

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Sir, let us suppose that as credit risks, banks perceived Martin Wolf and me as equally risky or equally safe. We would then, for the same ...
May 30, 2020

Free markets were set up to go bad, because of bad bank regulations.

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John Thornhill writes: “The global financial crisis of 2008 exploded the ideology that markets always deliver the goods” “ Three game-chang...
May 27, 2020

The doom loop between government and banks was created by regulators.

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Sir, I refer to Martin Arnold’s “ Soaring public debt poised to heap pressure on eurozone, ECB warns ” May 27 For the risk weighted bank c...
April 01, 2020

Does Martin Wolf’s “The tragedy of two failing superpowers” conform with FT’s beautiful motto of “without favour”?

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Wolf opines about Donald Trump in terms of “a malevolent incompetent” and for this looks for the support of that totally unbiased Jeffrey S...
March 29, 2020

British Museum’s “Currency in crisis: German emergency money 1914 – 1924”

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British Museum’s “Currency in crisis: German emergency money 1914 – 1924” “ Notgeld ”
March 25, 2020

Do we have a banking system with banks as they are supposed to be?

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Sir, I refer to your “ Non-bank lenders will bear brunt of credit crisis ”, March 25 John Augustus Shedd (1859–1928) opined: “A ship in...
March 18, 2020

The coronavirus will unleash a horrific Minsky moment in our bubbled-up debt overextended economies

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Sir, I refer to Martin Wolf’s “ The virus is an economic emergency too ” March 18.  Indeed, more than a week ago I tweeted: “The world ...
March 04, 2020

The seeds of the next debt crisis are to be found in the kicking of the 2008 crisis can forward, without correcting for what caused that crisis.

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Sir, I refer to John Plender’s “ The seeds of the next debt crisis ” March 4. Plender writes: “From the late 1980s, central banks — and...
March 03, 2020

Any risk, even if perfectly perceived, cause the wrong reactions, if excessively considered.

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Sir, I refer to Patrick Jenkins “ In our warming world, stranded energy assets are a growing concern ” March 3. It evidences the difficulti...
February 26, 2020

Do we need bankers, as in good loan officers, or bankers, as in creative financial engineers?

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Sir, I refer to your “ Europe’s banks are losing the global race for talent ” February 25. In general terms, and most especially with “Bank...
February 20, 2020

Never create a dependency on something that might not be able to deliver.

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Sir, this would be my response to Poland’s prime minister Mateusz Morawiecki’s “Setting an EU budget is about more than arithmetic ” Februa...
December 21, 2019

Should financing human rights’ violators help fund US pensions?

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Sir, I refer to Colby Smith’s “ Year began with ‘hardcore fear of missing out’ but now holders of Caracas debt have lost hope ” December 21...
December 19, 2019

Sir FT, do you, or our dear The Undercover Economist Tim Harford, have an explanation for what is a monstrous regulatory mistake?

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Sir, I refer to Tim Harford’s “ The Changing Face of Economics ” December 19. As an economist, if I were to regulate or supervise banks...
December 14, 2019

The bank capital requirements for Greek banks when lending to its government, should be the same as when lending to Greek entrepreneurs.

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Sir, Kerin Hope reports: “Christos Staikouras, the finance minister, told the Greek parliament the Hercules scheme would boost the stabilit...
December 09, 2019

Sovereign borrowings are never “for free”. There are always opportunity costs, especially when there’s so much distortion favoring it.

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Sir, you hold that “Fiscal stimulus can relieve monetary policy if invested wisely” “ Governments must learn to love borrowing again ” Dece...
December 04, 2019

Bank regulators rigged capitalism in favor of the state and the “safer” present and against the “riskier” future.

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Sir, Martin Wolf with respect to needed financial sector reforms mentions “Radical solution: raise the capital requirements of banking inte...
November 30, 2019

Artistic inheritance does not cause excessive centralized powers, as too often natural resources do...though intellectual inheritance could

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Sir, Janan Ganesh discussing the possible effect on Europe of its “intellectual and artistic inheritance” refers to the natural“resource cu...
November 27, 2019

Beware when issues, no matter how important, like climate change, become mostly discussed because of their distraction value

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Sir, Martin Wolf, after taking on a history tour argues: “A positive-sum vision of relations between the west, China and the rest has to be...
November 16, 2019

Current bank regulations are evidence free rather than evidence based

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Tim Harford suggests, “Pick a topic that matters to you”, “ How to survive an election with your sanity intact ” November 16. Ok. Bank ...
November 15, 2019

If Brexit goes hand in hand with a Baselexit, Britain will at least do better than now.

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Sir, Martin Wolf titles, [and I add], “ Irresponsible promises will hit brutal economic reality " November 15. Just like the irrespo...
November 03, 2019

If US’s 50 states had been assigned a 0% risk weight, as was done in the Eurozone, where would America and the US dollar be?

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Sir, Gyorgy Matolcsy opines: “Two decades after the euro’s launch, most of the necessary pillars of a successful global currency — a common...
November 01, 2019

Who is going to fact check the political ads on social media fact checkers? Big Brothers?

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Sir, you opine: “The spread of political advertising on social media requires companies fact-check political ads in collaboration with trus...
October 30, 2019

Well-invested small savings surpluses are better than big ones thrown away at fluffy sovereign spending projects.

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Sir, Martin Wolf correctly points out “Without the shelter of the eurozone, the Deutschmark would have greatly appreciated in a low-inflati...
October 29, 2019

What the Eurozone would need a common budget the most for, is to help rescue many of its members from their huge risky 0% risk weighted sovereign debts.

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Sir, Martin Arnold reports that Mario Draghi, “the outgoing ECB boss repeated his call for eurozone governments to create a sizeable common...
October 07, 2019

The dangerous distortions in the allocation of credit that risk weighted bank capital requirements cause, is seemingly something that shall not be discussed.

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... not even by those former central bankers who refuse to fade away Sir, with respects to “the attack on the European Central Bank’s b...
September 23, 2019

The Basel Committee jammed banks’ gearboxes… not only in India

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Amy Kazmin reporting on India quotes Rajeev Malik, founder of Singapore-based Macroshanti, in that “A well-oiled, well-functioning financi...
September 21, 2019

In banking, the worst worse case scenario by far, is something perceived as very safe turning out to be very risky

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Sir, Tim Harford writes “We don’t think about worst-case scenarios in the right way.” “To help us think sensibly about it, Gary Klein has a...
September 18, 2019

For capitalism to refunction, first get rid of the risk weighted bank capital requirements.

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Sir, Martin Wolf quotes HL Mencken with “For every complex problem, there is an answer that is clear, simple and wrong.” “ Saving capitalis...