GlobalSource Partners | Country Insights

Executive Summary The fiscal adjustment has reached a critical moment. To reduce the debt/GDP ratio, Brazil needs higher primary surpluses than promised by the government. Without political support for greater spending cuts, which cannot be restricted only to discretionary spending, the govern...

Cigarettes’ smuggling shooting with political taste

UKRAINE · In Brief · 13 Jul 2015

3 people shot dead and 13 injured in shooting between police and representatives of ultra-right political move “Right Sector” on July 11, in Mukachevo, small town at the Western Ukraine, near 40 km from Hungarian border. This event effectively blew up media and, as a consequence, political life o...

Weekly Tracker: July 12-18

TURKEY · Report · 12 Jul 2015

Executive Summary Long-delayed coalition talks will take start on Monday with a historical meeting between Davutoglu and Kilicdaroglu. The talks are expected to last through July, with final decisions to be made in August. With MHP largely out of the equation, personal trust between AKP and CHP l...

July 10 – The Shanghai Composite and the Keynesian beauty contest

CHINA FINANCIAL · In Brief · 10 Jul 2015 · 3 responses

For months I have been arguing that the most worrying source of volatility in the Chinese stock market was not its speculative nature nor even the unprecedented use of margin. It was the large share of Chinese investors whose strategy was to ride what they believed to be a bubble. This to me is w...

July 10 – A collective decision to rally

CHINA FINANCIAL · In Brief · 10 Jul 2015

With the market up 5.2% by 1 pm, I think the “correction” is over. Analysts have pointed out the many reasons for skepticism, most importantly, I think, that over half of the listed companies have suspended trading in their shares. The full buying power that Beijing can command, plus the return o...

Elections for the President of the Legislative Assembly Unsettles Political Balance

PANAMA · Report · 09 Jul 2015

On July 1, the first-year anniversary of the Varela administration, elections for the new president of the National Assembly (Panama’s legislative branch) took place. The importance of the National Assembly’s Presidency resides in the fact that it sets the legislative agenda, budgets and commitme...

Does size matter?

CHINA FINANCIAL · In Brief · 09 Jul 2015

The Chinese stock market panic is unlikely to trigger a financial crisis in China, but not, as many argue, because of its relatively small size and narrowly dispersed ownership. What matters is that although nationally there are significant mismatches between assets and liabilities among individu...

Why do financial crises happen?

CHINA FINANCIAL · In Brief · 09 Jul 2015

Financial crises are analogous to bank runs. They occur when the liquidity needed to bridge the gaps created by mismatches between assets and liabilities suddenly becomes unavailable. Insolvency by itself is not a sufficient condition, and only leads to a financial crisis when it causes creditors...

Should the government have intervened?

CHINA FINANCIAL · In Brief · 09 Jul 2015

After a terrifying beginning with Shanghai down 3.2%, markets turned around dramatically and Shanghai closed up 5.8% on the day. But 194 more companies suspended trading today. Over half of all companies now don’t trade. As I suggested yesterday, it wasn’t the subtle measures that proved most eff...

Default talks bring volatility at the FX market

UKRAINE · In Brief · 09 Jul 2015

In early July serenity at the FX market was finally broken. The first disturbing signal came from black market few days ago when foreign currency operations’ spread started widening. Finally yesterday official market also reflected the tendency: on July 8th sell bids on cash operations moved to n...

Does the Chinese stock market crash matter?

CHINA FINANCIAL · In Brief · 08 Jul 2015

· It is hard to argue that the stock rally had any significant positive economic impact, so some analysts argue that it collapse will not impact the economy either. · This may be true in a direct sense. But there are three important ways the stock market decline might matter. The first is direct....

What can the government do to move markets move in China?

CHINA FINANCIAL · In Brief · 08 Jul 2015

· Because China’s market is highly speculative, policies that are directed at improving the fundamental value of stocks will have almost no impact on market prices. · Uncertainty is currently so high that it will have sharply undermined the ability of speculators to agree collectively on how to i...

What might cause speculators to buy?

CHINA FINANCIAL · In Brief · 08 Jul 2015

Broadly speaking speculators buy or sell assets for two reasons: 1. Some event is expected to cause, either for technical or fundamental reasons, a near-term change in the supply of or demand for an asset large enough to affect prices, even if only temporarily, and they transact in anticipation o...

What policies can stabilize the market?

CHINA FINANCIAL · In Brief · 08 Jul 2015

We must avoid the tendency to think of interventions aimed at stabilizing markets as being independent of the structure of the market. In my Peking University seminar I warn my students that because most of the world’s leading economists have been directly or indirectly trained in a tradition tha...

China’s markets are unpredictable but mechanical

CHINA FINANCIAL · In Brief · 08 Jul 2015

China’s Spinal Tap stock market is a volatility machine whose every knob has been turned to eleven. Value investors lack the tools they need to project or value cashflow, and so cannot play their stabilizing role no matter what policy enticements are implemented. Policy interventions undermine th...