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’Buiter on odds of German vs Greek euro exits
Next up in the eurozone drama - Citi chief economist Willem Buiter, with colleague Ebrahim Rahbari, have contributed their 2012 outlook on the European crisis.
They believe the ECB is likely to come to the rescue.
Step inside the mind of Willem Buiter — but tread carefully
Bobby Robson, the former England football coach, once described a player as being so truculent he could have an argument with himself.
Willem Buiter has gone one better. In his latest note, the Citigroup chief economist has invented someone so he can have an argument.
Bazooka with cheese
Where would financiers be without metaphors? Let’s take Citi as an example — although we are sure there are worse offenders.
In Tuesday’s FT, Citi’s chief economist, Willem Buiter, called for a bigger ‘bazooka’ to boost the firepower of the EFSF.
Reflections on the latest Eurozone tape bomb
Kaboom.
For Tuesday, the market received a jolt higher in the final hour of trading after the Guardian reported France and Germany agreed to increase the size of Europe’s rescue package to more than €2 trillion ($2.7 trillion).
Citi: Euro area recession likely to begin in Q4
UPDATE: As a commenter pointed out, Willem Buiter didn’t write some of the sections we quoted from below, and we’ve updated accordingly. His name is at the top of the Citi note that we’re excerpting, but the actual passages were written by other economists.
Farewell G7 AAA’s
As rumours (scurrilous, nonsense – Ed.) swirl in the market of a French rating downgrade, Citigroup’s chief economist Willem Buiter is considering a much bigger issue – a world without any AAA G7 sovereigns.
Why water is energy, not an asset class
On Thursday, the highly esteemed Willem Buiter, chief economist at Citigroup, declared boldly in a research note that water would soon become the next big thing when it comes to commodity asset classes.
Willem Buiter thinks water will be bigger than oil
The folks at Citigroup are a thirsty bunch.
In a 37-page note on Thursday, the bank’s global strategists recommend investors play the urbanisation trend by buying into water companies (these ones to be specific),
Buiter bashes BoE accountability, and other central banks
Citigroup strategist and erstwhile FT blogger, Willem Buiter made headlines last week.
The former Monetary Policy Committee member, it was reported, took to the stand at a special hearing into ‘accountability at the Bank of England’ held by the UK Treasury Select Committee,
Citi’s new meme: 3G or ‘Global Growth Generators’
In a whopping report out Monday, Citi’s Willem Buiter and Ebrahim Rahbari call time on ‘Emerging Markets’ and ‘BRIC’ labels.
And not a moment too soon, we reckon.
Instead, the authors propose — you guessed it — a new meme:
Buiter on Europe’s secret liquidity operations
Willem Buiter wants you to familiarise yourself with the ELA.
That’s the Emergency Liquidity Assistance that the eurozone’s national central banks (NCBs) are able to provide their local banks under some legal fuzziness in the eurozone.
Buiter’s €2,000bn solution for the Eurozone
The latest (and as usual, substantial) note from Willem Buiter, chief economist at Citigroup, has landed in the FT Alphaville inbox.
The bulk of its 84 pages can be summarized in one line though: “no sovereign is really safe”
Buiter: ‘European sovereign debt kerfuffle’
Just as New York turns cold, our old friend Willem Buiter goes and warms us right back up.
We posted some fairly bombastic extracts from Buiter’s sovereign debt crisis essay on November 30. And at a Citi roundtable event on Wednesday,
Insolvent – Greece, Ireland, Portugal and probably Spain
Former FT blogger Willem, ‘Maverecon’, Buiter has lost none of his power to shock.
He may be the chief economist of Citigroup but that doesn’t mean he can’t speak his mind as his latest essay for the bank’s clients proves.
On the basics of how to tax banknotes
As documented by FT Alphaville, Willem Buiter has a thing for negative interest rates.
Most recently he’s been touting the idea again, this time in an opinion piece for the Wall Street Journal.
Leaving the economic case for negative interest rates aside for a minute,
Buiter, gangsters and euros – oh my
It’s no secret that we on FT Alphaville ♥ Willem Buiter.
But we really really ♥ the Citi economist and former FT blogger’s most recent European missive — from the Wall Street Journal’s eye-catchingly titled “How gangsters are saving the eurozone”:
Buiter: Markets are very noisy small children
Some FT readers undoubtedly remember – and miss – Willem Buiter’s inimitable turn of phrase since he left his Maverecon blog on FT.com for the undoubtedly more lucrative role of Citigroup’s chief economist,
A €2,000bn EuroTARP needed
Time to wrap a cold towel round the head.
Willem Buiter has been looking at the €860bn war chest the EU and the IMF have amassed to tackle the sovereign debt crisis in the eurozone and the unresolved question of what the cash might actually be used for.
Buiter, boiled down
Martin Wolf claims to have read (and, we guess, understood) all 68 pages of Willem Buiter’s recent tome, Sovereign Debt Problems in Advanced Industrial Countries.
But there was evidence on Wednesday that Buiter’s move from academia to commerce,
Buiter on Greece and a blueprint for a new Europe
Citi’s global economist, Willem Buiter, has done some serious, serious thinking on the issue of sovereign debt problems in the eurozone.
And here are the fruits of his labour — starting with Greece:
Down the drain in China
It probably won’t impress Willem Buiter, but the Chinese authorities have attempted to suck some more liquidity out of the system.
Via Bloomberg on Thursday:
The People’s Bank of China sold three-month bills at a yield of 1.4088 percent,
Is China blowing bubbles?
Yes, says Citigroup’s Willem Buiter, who thinks the Chinese authorities will fail in their efforts to prevent a classic boom, bubble and bust asset sequence.
Higher interest rates, renminbi appreciation and additional macro-prudential controls have all been mooted as way to prevent booms and bubbles developing in the Chinese land,
Buiter’s back
We haven’t heard much from the former Maverecon blogger since he moved to Citigroup to take up the role of chief economist.
But that changed on Thursday morning.
In Citi’s Global Economic Outlook and Strategy note,
The issue of shariah compliance and the Nakheel sukuk
When is a sukuk not a sukuk?
When it fails to be shariah compliant, of course.
And the key issues, it seems, that may or may not make a sukuk shariah-compliant relate to principal protection and the bondholder’s unsecured status.
Islamic finance to the rescue?
From Wikipedia:
Usury (pronounced /ˈjuːʒəri/, comes from the Medieval Latin usuria, “interest” or “excessive interest”, from the Latin usura “interest”) originally meant the charging of interest on loans.
The retrospective Buiter
Willem Buiter, former member of the Bank of England monetary policy committee, economist and FT ‘Maverecon’ blogger on Wednesday looked back through his voluminous works and commented thus (our emphasis):
Collateral damage at the ECB
Willem Buiter presents some interesting thoughts regarding the ECB’s one-year liquidity operation last week. What particularly strikes us is the following paragraph (our emphasis):
You may think that this implies that the cost to the banks of borrowing from the Eurosystem for a year – 1.00% – does not imply a subsidy,
Negative interest in cash, or goodbye banknotes
[Cash] is a redundant, indeed dominated medium of exchange and means of payment for legitimate transactions.
Or at least so says Willem Buiter, former BoE MPC member, and Maverick economist blogger in one of his recent negative-interest rate postings.