Ein Aufruf des Föhrenbergkreises – bitte unterschreiben Sie!

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Die aktuelle Finanz- und Wirtschaftskrise macht deutlich, dass die Finanzwirtschaft grundlegend zu reformieren ist. Doch die jetzt notwendigen substantiellen Reformen werden durch die Finanzlobby verhindert. Wir sind davon überzeugt, dass ein Aussitzen der Krise und ein Fortführen der bisherigen finanzwirtschaftlichen Praxis nicht zur Lösung, sondern zur Verschärfung der bereits kritischen Lage führen wird und die Zukunftsfähigkeit unserer Gesellschaft ernsthaft bedroht .

Daher fordern wir:

1. Die Wahrheit muss auf den Tisch: Wir wollen nicht mehr von der Finanzwirtschaft belogen werden und brauchen realistische Zukunftsversprechungen und Bilanzierungen.
2. Die Politik muss den Primat über die Finanzwirtschaft zurückgewinnen. Wir akzeptieren nicht, dass die Banken die Politik am Nasenring hinter sich herführen und die Einzelinteressen der Finanzwirtschaft den Gemeinwohlinteressen vorgeordnet werden.

Spareinlagen besichern Kreditausfälle. Neue Erkenntnisse zur Bankenbetriebswirtschaftslehre*

Stellungnahme des Föhrenbergkreises AK Finanzwirtschaft zu Aussagen der Notenbank und eines Bank CEOs

Frage: Als ich es in der Zeitung las (Presse, SN …) dachte ich zuerst an einen Druckfehler. Als Treichl das dann auch noch „Im Zentrum“ behauptet hat und niemand widersprochen hat, konnte ich es nicht fassen: Treichl behauptet allen Ernstes, dass das Ost-Engagement der Erste Group kein Risiko bedeutet, weil die Kredite mit entsprechenden lokalen Einlagen unterlegt sind. Zitat in der Presse: „In Tschechien und der Slowakei haben wir Kredite ausschließlich mit Einlagen aus diesen Ländern finanziert. Ich sehe nicht, wie das die Bonität Österreichs gefährden könnte.“ Ja was heißt denn das? Dass tschechische und slowakische Sparer für Kredite haften, die nicht mehr zurückbezahlt werden? So einfach ist es ja wohl nicht, oder?

Antwort: Natürlich läuft das nicht so – es wäre ja auch fatal, wenn ich als Sparer für Kredite haften muss, welche die Bank vergibt. Einleger haften nie für die Aktiva der Bank, im Gegenteil:  die Bank haftet mit ihren gesamten Nettoaktiven für die Einlagen und da spielt es praktisch auch keine Rolle, in welcher rechtlichen Einheit (Mutter- oder Tochtergesellschaft)  Vermögen bzw. Einlagen sich befinden. Im  Insolvenzfall sind allerdings die Einlagen gefährdet. Es gibt wohl auch in Tschechien und in der Slowakei für diesen Fall eine Einlagensicherung.  In dem Fall trifft es halt dann die dortigen Steuerzahler.

Frage: Und was ist das überhaupt für eine Logik: macht es die Situation besser, wenn nicht die österreichischen, sondern „nur“ die tschechischen und slowakischen Sparer betroffen sind? 

Memo from Davos: Down with Democracy!

Date: 27-01-2012
Source: The Huffington Post

Multinationals, responsible for creating millions of jobs, manage to pit governments against one another in terms of wages, work conditions and taxation. Political leaders flounder in countering multinationals’ claims about the need to reduce excessive regulations, fire workers at will or accrue huge profits for shareholders. The multinationals have more power, argues Daniel Bell for the Huffington Post: “the laws of the country must conform to the dictates of MNCs, rather than to the people’s will.” Company executives argue that their ability to select targets for charity is better than government programs relying on taxation, that a net increase of jobs anywhere in the globe has higher moral ground than protectionism. Bell concludes, “the clash may not be between good guys and bad guys, but rather between competing systems of morality.” In the clash between corporate-backed authoritarianism and democracy, nations must decide if some form of global governance could provide basic standards for all and tame the multinationals. – YaleGlobal

The End of the Win-Win World

Date: 27-01-2012
Source: Foreign Policy – GIDEON RACHMAN

Why China’s rise really is bad for America — and other dark forces at work.

I have spent my working life writing about international politics from the vantage points of the Economist and now the Financial Times. Surrounded by people who tracked markets and business, it has always felt natural for me to see international economics and international politics as deeply intertwined.

In my book Zero-Sum Future, written in 2009, I attempted to predict how the global economic crisis would change international politics. As the rather bleak title implied, I argued that relations between the major powers were likely to become increasingly tense and conflict-ridden. In a worsening economic climate, it would be harder for the big economies to see their relationships as mutually beneficial — as a win-win. Instead, they would increasingly judge their relationships in zero-sum terms. What was good for China would be seen as bad for America. What was good for Germany would be bad for Italy, Spain, and Greece.

Creating an Economy That’s ‘Built to Last’

Date: 27-01-2012
Source: BUSINESSWEEK By James Dyson

Obama wants America to get back to the business of making things. That means developing skilled workers at home while taking a global view

President Obama is right: America’s long-term success hinges on its ability to invent technology the world wants. It seems simple, but getting America back in the business of making things isn’t. It’s a global process. An idea born in Silicon Valley could be engineered in Switzerland, tested in China, and assembled in Taiwan. A stimulus to boost manufacturing may help the U.S. economy in the short term, but reinvigorating postwar-style production or space-race ingenuity is impossible without an increasingly capable workforce. Business demands it. And without it, long-term success will remain elusive.

These days manufacturing extends far beyond the assembly line. It’s about inventing and solving problems: researching, testing, and experimenting with ideas and technology. The development of new products more and more defies borders. It’s impossible to make electronic goods exclusively on U.S. or U.K. soil—the supplier base, infrastructure, and often the expertise needed to produce everything from electric cars to solar panels is dispersed.

Cameron really knows how to annoy Germany

Date: 27-01-2012
Source: The Financial Times
Subject: Cameron rebukes euro leaders over crisis

David Cameron has delivered a firm rebuke to Germany at the World Economic Forum, calling on Berlin to contribute significantly more resources and guarantees to help solve the eurozone crisis.

The British prime minister stressed on Thursday that although progress had been made, particularly with the European Central Bank’s funding of the European banking system, policymakers were still far from finding a solution to the underlying problems of the crisis. He criticised eurozone leaders for being distracted by other issues, such as the introduction of a financial transaction tax – an initiative he described as “quite simply madness”.

Date: 27-01-2012
Source: The Wall Street Journal
Subject: Banks Face Bind Over Cash Pile

DAVOS, Switzerland—After receiving nearly half a trillion euros in cheap loans from the European Central Bank last month, the Continent’s banks face a dilemma: to invest the money in lucrative but potentially risky government bonds or hoard the cash at a loss.

The choice reflects the uncertainty surrounding Europe’s financial system at a time when dark clouds continue to hover over the euro-zone economy and its common currency. Regardless of whether banks use the money to buy bonds or simply stash it at the central bank for safekeeping, consumers and businesses are unlikely to see much of the funds pumped back into the economy in the form of loans.

The ECB in December extended about €489 billion ($640.88 billion) in three-year loans to hundreds of banks that operate in the euro zone. The loan program was primarily designed to fend off a potential cash crunch. European banks face hundreds of billions of euros of debt coming due this year and, with funding markets shut to all but the strongest institutions, some banks faced the prospect of serious liquidity problems.

Bankers and government officials gathered in Davos, Switzerland, this week for the World Economic Forum are virtually unanimous that the ECB’s loans have eliminated such fears, at least for now. And the ECB is poised at the end of February to offer banks another chance to take out the loans. Bankers and analysts expect them to borrow hundreds of billions more.

The Shining Star of Europe?

Author: David Beckworth · January 25th, 2012 ·RGE EconoMonitor

Fareed Zakaria points us to what may be the shinning star of Europe:

[P]erhaps the biggest reason for poverty-stricken nations like Egypt to pay close attention to Poland is that it is a very rare breed in today’s world, especially in Europe. Poland has a strong economy – the sixth biggest in the European Union now and the only European Union country to avoid a recession altogether. None of its banks needed to be rescued. Its economy grew 4% last year, and is on track to grow 3% in 2012. Why, you’ll ask. How did it survive the turmoil in the Euro Zone? One answer is that it has strong domestic demand and has been pouring money into infrastructure projects. But the real – and fortuitous – reason is that Poland has yet to be allowed in to the Euro Zone – it continues to use zlotys instead of the euro. So unlike Greece or Italy, it was able to devalue its currency to stay competitive.

I know that last part will leave some of my hard money readers in angst, so think of it this way. Poland has been able to stabilize domestic demand by adjusting its monetary policy accordingly. The Eurozone periphery has not been able to do this and paid dearly as seen below:

Financial Crises 1810-2010

A new graphic from HistoryShots, based on Reinhart & Rogoff’s well researched book: This Time Is Different: Eight Centuries of Financial Folly. The top half of the chart maps financial crises in terms of GDP affected, while the bottom indicates number of sovereign defaults.

http://www.historyshots.com/viewzoom.cfm?loc=FinancialCrisis

Economic Indicators Dashboard: What’s the state of the US economy?

http://chartporn.org/2012/01/23/update-economic-indicators-dashboard-5/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+ChartPorn+%28Chart+Porn%29

Angela Merkel discovers her inner European

The euro crisis appears to have ignited in the German chancellor a passion for the EU

Ian Traynor, Europe editor, guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 25 January 2012 12.50 GMT

Angela Merkel has been thrust unambiguously, if reluctantly, into the top seat at the EU table. Photograph: Sean Gallup/Getty Images

Angela Merkel‘s predecessor, Gerhard Schröder, was the first German chancellor spared any memory of the Hitler years. That explains why, the story goes, he was the first German leader to view the European Union pragmatically, as a utilitarian, not an idealistic project.

With the second world war, the EU’s founding myth, ever more remote from the generation of leaders in power in Europe, Merkel is considered to have continued that trend – putting Germany first, indirectly insisting that to succeed Europe has to become more German.

The sovereign debt and single currency crises of the past two years have raised existential issues about the EU, questions about its longevity and survival, which would have appeared ludicrous if asked only a few years ago.

In the intensity of the crisis, with Merkel and Germany thrust unambiguously, if reluctantly, into the top seat at the EU table, the chancellor seems to be gradually discovering her inner European.

In an interview in the gleaming Berlin chancellery with the Guardian and partner newspapers from France, Italy, Spain, Poland and Germany,

EU-Kommissar Rehn zur Schuldenkrise: Euro-Staaten müssen mehr für Griechenland zahlen

26.01.2012, 17:27, sz

Der Verzicht privater Gläubiger wird nicht reichen: EU-Kommissar Olli Rehn hält weitere staatliche Hilfen für Griechenland für unausweichlich. „Wir bereiten ein Paket vor, das den Weg für eine nachhaltige Lösung freimacht“, sagte Rehn. An den Finanzmärkten herrscht Alarmstimmung: Die Renditen für griechische und portugiesische Staatsanleihen schnellten auf Rekordniveau.

Schuldenschnitt, zwei Rettungspakete und Hilfsfonds sind nicht genug, um die griechische Schuldenkrise unter Kontrolle zu bringen. Für die Rettung des Landes sind laut EU-Finanzkommissar Olli Rehn weitere staatliche Hilfen zwingend nötig. Das bedeutet, dass Euro-Staaten wie Deutschland noch mehr beitragen müssen. Das sagte er der Nachrichtenagentur Reuters am Rande des Weltwirtschaftsforums im Schweizer Davos. Rehns Sprecher bestätigte die Angaben der Süddeutschen Zeitung.

Um wie geplant die Schuldenlast des Euro-Staates bis 2020 von derzeit gut 160 Prozent auf 120 Prozent des Bruttoinlandsprodukts zu senken, werde der Forderungsverzicht der privaten Gläubiger in Höhe von 50 Prozent nicht ausreichen, sagte Rehn. Diese Lücke müssten die Euro-Staaten und die EU-Institutionen füllen. Wie viel Geld genau fehlte, wollte er nicht sagen.

„Wir bereiten ein Paket vor, das den Weg für eine nachhaltige Lösung freimacht“, (schon wieder!) sagte der Finne. „Es wird dabei wahrscheinlich einen höheren Bedarf an Finanzierung durch den öffentlichen Sektor geben, aber nichts Dramatisches.“