Chin Up, People!

The Times reports:

Consumer confidence fell to its lowest level in at least 40 years, a survey said Tuesday, as falling home prices and steep declines in the stock market took a sharp toll on the faith of Americans in the economy.

A widely watched survey by the private Conference Board, which dates back four decades, plunged to its lowest reading on record in October as Americans reported fewer jobs and smaller incomes and curtailed plans for major purchases like cars and appliances.

Americans also say they believe the economy will worsen before it improves — a sign of deeply engrained pessimism that reflects a year of painful declines in stocks, jobs and home values....

Lowest in forty years? Lower than 1981-82? 73-74? We have a long way to go before it's that bad, and I doubt things will get that far.

We Are All Keynesians Now

Robert Lucas: "I guess everyone is a Keynesian in a foxhole." From Justin Fox, "The Comeback Keynes" (extended quote here).

Apparently you can't get out of a foxhole by assuming a ladder...

Flight to Safety?

One of the bigger ironies of the financial crisis is that the US has troubled financial institutions, a plunging stock market and a ballooning government budget deficit and demand for our government bonds is increasing: (keep in mind that the price and yield are inversely related). And now we also see a spike in demand for our currency: (foreign currency per dollar). Even the presumably relatively safe Pound and Euro took a plunge last week: (note that the scale is opposite, so the Dollar is still appreciating). However, the Japanese Yen seems relatively immune, relative to the Dollar, which means it is also jumping in terms of other currencies: In troubled times, demand for assets deemed "safe" (or "liquid" or "quality") traditionally goes up, which is why things like emerging market debt and junk bonds often suffer, regardless of the virtues (or lack thereof) of the issuers. But it is quite remarkable that, for all that is going wrong in the US, we are still on the receiving end of this flight to safety effect.

How much of this to attribute to virtue versus good fortune is a good question for international economists and economic historians to contemplate. More immediately, despite all their prudent reserve-building since the crises of the late 1990's, emerging markets are once again getting hit hard. Dani Rodrik sees an urgent need for IMF action. See also Arvind Subramanian, Brad Setser and Naked Capitalism.

From a US standpoint, although we are better off with a flight into, rather than out of our currency and assets (which would cause a huge spike in long-term interest rates), the Dollar's rise is hardly benign. Until recently, the mostly-non-panicky drift downward of the Dollar was helping turn around the current account deficit - a sustained move in the other direction would be trouble for exporting and import-competing industries (indeed, Rodrik fears this could lead to protectionism).

Another Devil in the Details?

The Treasury is using its recapitalization to encourage consolidation in the banking sector, but it is not doing anything to force banks to actually lend money, according to the Times' Joe Nocera:

On Thursday, at a hearing of the Senate Banking Committee, the chairman, Christopher J. Dodd, a Connecticut Democrat, pushed Neel Kashkari, the young Treasury official who is Mr. Paulson’s point man on the bailout plan, on the subject of banks’ continuing reluctance to make loans. How, Senator Dodd asked, was Treasury going to ensure that banks used their new government capital to make loans — “besides rhetorically begging them?”

“We share your view,” Mr. Kashkari replied. “We want our banks to be lending in our communities.”

Senator Dodd: “Are you insisting upon it?”

Mr. Kashkari: “We are insisting upon it in all our actions.”

But they are doing no such thing. Unlike the British government, which is mandating lending requirements in return for capital injections, our government seems afraid to do anything except plead. And those pleas, in this environment, are falling on deaf ears.

Yes, there are times when a troubled bank needs to be acquired by a stronger bank. Given that the federal government insures deposits, it has an abiding interest in seeing that such mergers take place as smoothly as possible. Nobody is saying those kinds of deals shouldn’t take place...

We have long been a country that has treasured its diversity of banks; up until the 1980s, in fact, there were no national banks at all. If Treasury is using the bailout bill to turn the banking system into the oligopoly of giant national institutions, it is hard to see how that will help anybody. Except, of course, the giant banks that are declared the winners by Treasury.

It is worth noting that the Canadian banking system, which is an oligopoly of giant national institutions, appears to be holding up quite well.

The End of the 1980's?

Since the 1980's began when video killed the radio star, perhaps that is the wrong medium to declare their end, which I did in a commentary for the local NPR station:

Ronald Reagan was fond of an aphorism attributed to Thomas Jefferson: the government which governs least, governs best. During the debate over the financial rescue, one Republican Congressman described the legislation as a coffin on top of Ronald Reagan's coffin. That the proposal he was criticizing came from a Republican President and his Wall Street treasury secretary shows how much things have changed.Regulation is not the only area of economic policy where the 1980's mentality is coming to an end. The so-called supply side economics that motivated the tax cuts under Reagan and George W. Bush has also been discredited by events...

Info-Graphic

This "interactive graphic" of US economic indicators from the Times is truly impressive.

Bernanke, white knight upon a firey steed?

"Helicopter Ben" rides to the rescue.

And yes, I believe those are the helicopters from "Apocalypse Now" - who doesn't love the smell of swap lines in the morning? (Hat tip: Mankiw)

Roll Over, Ayn Rand

and tell Herbert Spencer the news. The Times reports:

[A] humbled Mr. Greenspan admitted that he had put too much faith in the self-correcting power of free markets and had failed to anticipate the self-destructive power of wanton mortgage lending.“Those of us who have looked to the self-interest of lending institutions to protect shareholders’ equity, myself included, are in a state of shocked disbelief,” he told the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform.

Floyd Norris: "What was missing was a regulator who understood markets, rather than worshiped them."

Since some of my students seem to actually like Ayn Rand, I will outsource the obligatory Rand-bashing to Dean Baker, who does it well. Actually, I do think Greenspan does deserve some credit for admitting error, at least a little bit. As Keynes said, "when the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do sir?"

Update (10/25): This video at Calculated Risk reveals uncanny parallels between Greenspan and Smooth Jimmy Apollo and Captain Renault.

Update #2 (10/26): Although Greenspan was a member of Rand's circle and contributed several chapters to "Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal," the Rand-ites have apparently excommunicated him (see also the comments to this post). Hat tip: Marginal Revolution.

A Devil in the Details

Although Secretary Paulson's move towards using the $700 billion war chest to add to bank capital (i.e., make equity investments in them) rather than buying "troubled" assets has been widely applauded, the terms are not good, according to Willem Buiter:

Unfortunately, Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson’s injection of $125 billion into the nine banks (out of a total capital injection budget provisionally set at $250bn (but bound to rise to probably around twice that amount), carved out of the $700 bn made available (in tranches) by the 2008 Economic Stability Emergency Act, was almost a free gift to these banks. In this it was different from the case of AIG, where the Fed and the Treasury imposed rather tough terms on the shareholders and obtained pretty favourable terms for the US tax payer generally. It was also unlike the case of Fannie and Freddie, where the old shareholders are likely not to recover anything.

In the case of the Fortunate Nine, the injection of capital is through (non-voting) preference shares yielding a ridiculously low interest rate (5 percent as opposed to the 10 percent obtained by Warren Buffett for his capital injectcion into Goldman Sachs). Without voting shares, the government has no voice in the running of these banks. It also has no seats on their boards. By contrast, in the Netherlands, the injection of €10bn worth of subordinated debt into ING bank comes with a price tag that includes two government directors on the board and a government veto over all strategic decisions by the bank.

In addition, in the the case of the Fortunate Nine, there are no attractively valued warrants (options to convert, at some future time, the preference shares into ordinary shares at a set price or at a price determined by some known formula). Quite the opposite, the preference shares purchased by the US state, can be repurchased after three years, at the banks’ discretion, on terms that are highly attractive to the banks. The US tax payer is not only getting a lousy deal compared to private US investors like Buffett, (s)he is also doing much worse than the British tax payer in the UK version of Paulson’s capital injection (£37 bn so far out of provisional budget of £50bn). The UK preference shares have a 12 percent yield and come with government-appointed board members.

The terms are not good for the US taxpayer, that is, but they are favorable Paulson's financial sector friends. I would feel much better if Bernanke - or the Obama administration - was running the show.

Recession Hits Home

I had thought myself personally rather immune from the effects of the economic downturn until I received some very bad news in the cookie aisle, confirmed by this Battle Creek Enquirer report:

Citing rising food and fuel costs, two subsidiaries of Archway & Mother's Cookie Company Inc. have filed for bankruptcy, effectively shutting down the firm's U.S. operations.

In a news release, Archway said the subsidiaries, Mother's Cake & Cookie Co. and Archway Cookies LLC, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy on Monday in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the District of Delaware.

The announcement came three days after the company sent notices to the cities of Battle Creek and Ashland, Ohio, stating that the two locations would close, putting approximately 160 people out of work, 59 of those in Battle Creek.

Can these guys get a bailout, please?

And if "rising food and fuel costs" are really the problem, can't they change their mind now that the downturn has caused commodity prices to fall?

The next stimulus check goes straight into cookies.