Финансиска криза во САД и Европа

08.10.2019 - Brussels calls for fiscal action to avert EU recession as shocks mount The European Commission has issued a stark warning to EU finance ministers, calling for concerted fiscal stimulus to head off a recession and avert a protracted downturn before it is too late. A briefing document for tomorrow's Eurogroup meeting said the twin shocks of a no-deal Brexit and US car tariffs of 25pc days later risks compounding the current global trade slump and could test the limits of eurozone policy. The Commission said it was no longer good enough to wait for the hammer blows to hit before responding, given the long lag times before budget stimulus feeds through. “Slowing growth and the downside risks inherent to the current situation may call for a pre-emptive, rather than reactive, approach to fiscal policy," it said. “The worldwide weakening of growth and trade will be deeper and last longer than originally supposed,” said the text, obtained by the German press. The eurozone must brace for a “period of protracted weak growth”. The EU authorities in Brussels have been slow to grasp the magnitude of the global economic downturn – erroneously counting on a swift rebound by China and emerging markets – but the blizzard of grim data from Germany and the deepening industrial recession has finally set off alarm bells. This comes at a crucial moment in the Brexit showdown and raises the political stakes of a no-deal. Brussels has until recently been briefing that the EU is strong enough to take a disorderly withdrawal on the chin, even though its £95bn trade surplus with the UK is at risk and broken supply chains could be very disruptive. It is clear that dissenting opinion is at last making itself heard in Brussels. A joint statement by 23 automotive groups across Europe last month warned that a no-deal would shatter just-in-time supply chains and amount to a “devastating” and “seismic” blow to the car industry at a time when auto companies are already facing an existential crisis. “Brexit is not just a British problem, we are all concerned,” said the statement. A report last week by Germany’s five top economic institutes said financial feedback loops and likely contagion meant that a no-deal would do significantly more damage than suggested by simplistic trade models. The Commission text said strong private consumption and falling unemployment in the eurozone had so far acted as an economic buffer but warned that trouble was starting to infect the labour market as well. End of austerity The plea for fiscal stimulus shows how far Brussels has shifted from the austerity agenda of the last decade, when it was forever lecturing laggards on the need to retrench. But whatever the change in mood, it still has to navigate the Stability Pact and Fiscal Compact, which have a contractionary bias and are written into EU law. The legal paraphernalia was established on German insistence as an alternative to eurozone fiscal union. It renders policy almost unworkable in pre-crisis conditions. Only Germany and other low-debt fiscal “saints” have room for stimulus under this legal structure, and Berlin shows little willingness to oblige. Its green energy plan may boost fiscal spending by 0.4pc of GDP a year over the next four years but even that is unclear. Finance minister Olaf Scholz says there will be no big fiscal package unless and until a crisis actually hits, citing the debt brake fixed by Germany’s Basic Law and the “black zero” rule of a balanced budget. Automatic stabilisers are deemed enough to cope with the current German slump. Citigroup said there was little appetite for a meaningful fiscal blitz. “As is often the case policy action will likely be too little too late, despite multiple warnings,” it said. The Commission said monetary policy would normally be the tool for “fighting recession” but this has lost its efficacy in zero-rate world. The European Central Bank’s latest stimulus package – a cut in rates to minus 0.5pc and a relaunch of bond purchases – has failed on several fronts already. Funding markets have tightened and inflation expectations have fallen further. The household savings rate in the eurozone jumped from 12.3pc last year to 13.3pc in the second quarter, a nine-year high. It has hit 18.1pc in Germany. Negative rates are causing savers to put aside more money. The policy is leading to a contraction in demand. The ECB may have reached the “reversal rate” where cuts do more harm than good, eating into the business models of the banks. While eurozone M1 money growth looks robust the signals may be misleading. Companies fear losing access to funding markets and are building a safety buffer of cash. Impasse Whatever the theoretical arguments, the ECB has reached a political dead end. Nine council members from countries making up over half Euroland GDP have attacked the latest package. “This loose money policy leads to less growth and lower productivity,” said Austria’s central bank governor Robert Holzmann. The eurozone has reached an impasse. Monetary policy is exhausted and fiscal stimulus – beyond tinkering – is constrained by a tangle of rules and laws, so complex that the Commission has to provide a guide book to frustrated officials in national capitals. Now the currency bloc faces a barrage of recessionary shocks. This concentrates the mind. EU leaders must decide over coming days whether to engage seriously with Boris Johnson on his Brexit plan or whether to gamble on the Benn Act, an Article 50 extension, and a fresh referendum. If they get it wrong and instead precipitate a no-deal, the economic chain reaction could spin out of control for them as well as for Britain. It is high-octane brinkmanship. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2019/10/08/brussels-calls-fiscal-action-avert-eu-recession-shocks-mount/