In The News

Worries Over China’s Slowdown Drive Global Markets

Farok J. Contractor January 21, 2016
Global markets are plummeting, in part a response to slowing growth in China and volatility in the nation’s stock markets. “World markets turn needlessly bearish – failing to understand that the Shanghai or Shenzhen markets are not necessarily good indicators of the fundamentals of the Chinese economy or cultural root causes driving Chinese investors,” writes Farok Contractor, a professor at...

A Towering Chinese Debt Mountain Looms Over Markets

Enda Curran January 15, 2016
Slowed growth in the world’s second largest economy, combined with heavy debt and currency volatility, is dragging down global markets. Since 2007, China and other countries responded to the global financial crisis with loose monetary policy. China’s “government is constrained by a credit bubble that has ballooned to $28 trillion in an economy growing at its slowest pace in 25 years,” reports...

Irredeemable?

January 8, 2016
By the end of 2016, Brazil’s economy may be 8 percent smaller than it was during the first quarter of 2014, reports the Economist. Commodity prices are slumping, and GDP could shrink by a fifth. Some call for the president’s impeachment; legislators are under investigation for accepting bribes related to contracts with the state-controlled oil-and-gas company, Petrobras. The Economist describes...

The World's Multi-Trillion Dollar Bond Market Is Circling the Drain

Ben Wright November 23, 2015
The world is awash in debt, more than $225 trillion in all by some reports. Warning bells are going off about a lack of liquidity in bond markets amid anticipation for the US Federal Reserve to begin gradually lifting interest rates. Prices of bonds already in the market will fall as interest rates rise because investors will pursue the new bonds with higher yields. Stimulus spending by...

Crisis Without End: The Disintegration of the European Project

Brendan Simms and Timothy Less November 14, 2015
Europeans and their leaders increasingly struggle over integration. Writing for New Statesman, Brendan Simms and Timothy Less remind that such struggles have historical precedents, including the breakups of Austria-Hungary, Yugoslavia and the Soviet Union. Those examples are used to analyze a scenario for possible collapse of the European Union. EU integration has grown at a fast pace. “This was...

Surge in Protectionist Measures Blamed for Sapping Trade

William Mauldin November 13, 2015
Global trade is in decline in terms of value and volume. “On average G20 exports have fallen 4.5% since world trade peaked in value in October 2014,” notes a report from Global Trade Alert. Countries resort to protectionist measures to preserve growth and jobs. William Mauldin writes about the report for the Wall Street Journal: “India, Russia and the U.S. have imposed the most ‘trade-distorting...

Is the USDA Silencing Scientists?

Brandon Keim November 3, 2015
The US government may muzzle some of its research scientists who investigate controversial topics. Each department has its own rules, and federal workers are often expected to seek approval from before submitting articles or books for publication, which can delay release of findings or lead to outright denials from timid supervisors who fear funding cuts. Brandon Keim details the experiences of a...