Saturday, November 15, 2008

"The U.S. will experience its most severe recession since World War II"

I don't know what to do with Roubini's posts on Forbes now:

"In each case, the optimists argued that the latest crisis and rescue policy response was the cathartic event that signaled the bottom of the crisis and the recovery of markets. They were wrong literally at least six times in a row as the crisis--as I have consistently predicted over the last year--became worse and worse. So enough of the excessive optimism that has been proved wrong at least six times in the last eight months alone.

A reality check is needed to assess risks--and to take appropriate action. And reality tells us that we barely avoided, only a week ago, a total systemic financial meltdown; that the policy actions are now finally more aggressive and systematic, and more appropriate; that it will take a long while for interbank and credit markets to mend; that further important policy actions are needed to avoid the meltdown and an even more severe recession; that central banks, instead of being the lenders of last resort, will be, for now, the lenders of first and only resort; that even if we avoid a meltdown, we will experience a severe U.S., advanced economy and, most likely, global recession, the worst in decades; that we are in the middle of a severe global financial and banking crisis, the worst since the Great Depression; and that the flow of macro, earnings and financial news will significantly surprise (as during the last few weeks) on the downside with significant further risks to financial markets.

I'll stop now."

I tend to see things this way anyway, but I'm not convinced that he's correct, mainly because I find predictions pretty much useless. It's better just to keep doing sensible things all the time. So, he doesn't scare me, any more than I would be on my own. But when I look at how things are going, I honestly thought that they would have gone worse, so far.

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