PeacePlan
09-23-2008, 09:44 PM
http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2008/...nk-crisis.html (http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2008/09/5-trillion-needed-to-stop-bank-crisis.html)
Quote:
Ken Ohmae, former head of McKinsey's Tokyo office (disclosure: I have a passing acquaintence with him and he was enormously well regarded in his day despite being a tireless self-promoter) says that the Paulson program is grossly inadequate and the magnitude of the US crisis is so large that a $5 trillion international facility is necessary.
The quid pro quo of any international program is that the US would be put on a short leash, probably not as severe as the one to which Indonesia and Thailand were subject to in the Asian crisis. But the US is not good at austerity and has never been in the position of not being in the driver's seat, so this sort of initiative would no doubt be rejected until it is too late for it to have much impact.
From Bloomberg (http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=a8DIq9yO0vzY) (hat tip reader Saboor):
Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson's $700 billion plan to buy devalued assets from financial companies is ``a joke'' because it doesn't go far enough to calm markets, said Kenichi Ohmae, president of Business Breakthrough Inc.
Ohmae, nicknamed ``Mr. Strategy'' during his 23 years as a McKinsey & Co. partner, called for a $5 trillion ``international facility'' to be made available to financial institutions. The system could be modeled on one used by Sweden during its banking crisis in the early 1990s, he said.
``This is a liquidity crisis,'' Ohmae said at an investor forum hosted by CLSA Asia-Pacific Markets, the regional broking arm of Credit Agricole SA, in Hong Kong yesterday. ``The liquidity has to be so big that people won't get panicky.''...
Ohmae, 65, is the author of management books including ``The Mind of The Strategist,'' ``The Borderless World'' and ``The End of the Nation State.'' Business Breakthrough, founded in 1998, provides online management training.
One way of funding the $5 trillion facility would be through contributions from foreign exchange reserves in China, Japan, Taiwan, the Gulf states, the European Union and Russia, Ohmae said.
An international relief effort on that scale might be difficult to coordinate, said Robert Howe, founder of Hong Kong- based hedge fund manager Geomatrix (HK) Ltd., which oversees $32 million. ``I doubt the practicality of getting international cooperation on something like this,'' he said.
Ohmae compared the current financial crisis with Japan's 15- year economic decline that began in 1989. Both started with a property bubble, which wiped out companies' equity when it burst, and like in Japan, the current one could lead to escalating bankruptcies as banks worried about their own survival rein in lending, he said.
The financial-market upheaval may lead to slower growth in China and the reversal of the commodity boom as ship orders are canceled and steel supply dumped, said Ohmae. What Ohmae called Japan's ``Viagra'' economy and Australia's ``dig and deliver'' boom may also fizzle as China weakens, he said.
Against the backdrop of a potential global market panic, Paulson's plan is insufficient, said Ohmae.....
``He wants to fix problems one by one as if he were still the chief executive officer of Goldman Sachs,'' he said. ``He has to take his CEO hat completely off and come up with a systemic solution as opposed to a one-by-one solution.''
Quote:
Ken Ohmae, former head of McKinsey's Tokyo office (disclosure: I have a passing acquaintence with him and he was enormously well regarded in his day despite being a tireless self-promoter) says that the Paulson program is grossly inadequate and the magnitude of the US crisis is so large that a $5 trillion international facility is necessary.
The quid pro quo of any international program is that the US would be put on a short leash, probably not as severe as the one to which Indonesia and Thailand were subject to in the Asian crisis. But the US is not good at austerity and has never been in the position of not being in the driver's seat, so this sort of initiative would no doubt be rejected until it is too late for it to have much impact.
From Bloomberg (http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=a8DIq9yO0vzY) (hat tip reader Saboor):
Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson's $700 billion plan to buy devalued assets from financial companies is ``a joke'' because it doesn't go far enough to calm markets, said Kenichi Ohmae, president of Business Breakthrough Inc.
Ohmae, nicknamed ``Mr. Strategy'' during his 23 years as a McKinsey & Co. partner, called for a $5 trillion ``international facility'' to be made available to financial institutions. The system could be modeled on one used by Sweden during its banking crisis in the early 1990s, he said.
``This is a liquidity crisis,'' Ohmae said at an investor forum hosted by CLSA Asia-Pacific Markets, the regional broking arm of Credit Agricole SA, in Hong Kong yesterday. ``The liquidity has to be so big that people won't get panicky.''...
Ohmae, 65, is the author of management books including ``The Mind of The Strategist,'' ``The Borderless World'' and ``The End of the Nation State.'' Business Breakthrough, founded in 1998, provides online management training.
One way of funding the $5 trillion facility would be through contributions from foreign exchange reserves in China, Japan, Taiwan, the Gulf states, the European Union and Russia, Ohmae said.
An international relief effort on that scale might be difficult to coordinate, said Robert Howe, founder of Hong Kong- based hedge fund manager Geomatrix (HK) Ltd., which oversees $32 million. ``I doubt the practicality of getting international cooperation on something like this,'' he said.
Ohmae compared the current financial crisis with Japan's 15- year economic decline that began in 1989. Both started with a property bubble, which wiped out companies' equity when it burst, and like in Japan, the current one could lead to escalating bankruptcies as banks worried about their own survival rein in lending, he said.
The financial-market upheaval may lead to slower growth in China and the reversal of the commodity boom as ship orders are canceled and steel supply dumped, said Ohmae. What Ohmae called Japan's ``Viagra'' economy and Australia's ``dig and deliver'' boom may also fizzle as China weakens, he said.
Against the backdrop of a potential global market panic, Paulson's plan is insufficient, said Ohmae.....
``He wants to fix problems one by one as if he were still the chief executive officer of Goldman Sachs,'' he said. ``He has to take his CEO hat completely off and come up with a systemic solution as opposed to a one-by-one solution.''