Os limites do otimismo

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Não haverá milagre na Grécia, mas destruir as classes médias não é solução

O notável artigo de Michael Pettis, que abordámos em post anterior, dedicado ao pensamento efeverscente e maniqueísta sobre as responsabilidades pelas crises grega, cipriota, portuguesa, espanhola, italiana, e em geral da maioria dos países europeus, demonstrando que o capitalismo global é um sistema de vasos comunicantes onde as crises financeiras tendem a assumir natureza sistémica, exigindo, por esta razão, remédios permanentemente concertados, precisa talvez de uma contextualização económica mais ampla.

Recomendo, por isso, a leitura de um outro artigo recente, não menos notável, de Gail Tverberg, analista de risco, editora do extinto e célebre The Oil Drum, e autora do blogue Our Finite World.

Gail Tverberg considera, como eu e um número crescente de observadores, que nos aproximamos ou estamos já no quadro energético previsto por M. King Hubbert [1956, “Nuclear Energy and the Fossil Fuels”—pdf], conhecido como Pico do Petróleo. Este quadro casa, aliás, com um outro mais recente, traçado em 1972 pela equipa do relatório The Limits to Growth, que analisa os limites do paradigma de crescimento em que ainda vivemos, do qual temos que sair, mas ninguém sabe como.

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Os quadros estatísitcos têm vindo a confluir na perceção de que estamos no fim de uma longa era de prosperidade e crescimento explosivo, único na história humana, cujos motores principais foram o carvão mineral, o petróleo e o gás natural, a par de descobertas e invenções tão extraordinárias quando a eletricidade, a energia nuclear, a higiene e o saneamento básico, ou as vacinas e os antibióticos.

Sem energia abundante e barata o paradigma civilizacional em que nascemos e nos habituámos a perceber como natural há três coisas que desaparecerão depois de sucessivas e dolorosas crises:

• taxas de crescimento demográfico e económico acima dos 2%
• crescimento baseado na utilização de capital intensivo e em endividamento
• boa parte da atividade discricionária não produtiva, nomeadamente o consumo conspícuo de massas.

Esta versão inesperada de The Tragedy of the Commons [Garrett Hardin, 1968] parece já estar, de facto, em cena num qualquer smartphone, ou televisão perto de si. O aparente triunfo argumentativo de Yanis Varoufakis face à inércia burocrática de Bruxelas e Berlim, e face ao defensismo atávico do BCE e do sistema financeiro em geral, espelha bem que o problema que temos entre mãos é um daqueles problemas a que Hardin chamou “a no technical solution problem”.

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Recomendando desde já a leitura integral do artigo em três partes de Gail Tverberg reproduzi a modo de convite alguns extratos e alguns gráficos esclarecedores. Quem quer que seja que pretenda chegar ao poder, nomeadamente para mtigar a contínua má direção que temos seguido, deverá, antes de mais, ler atentamente os três artigos aqui citados—o de Gail Tverberg, o de Michael Pettis, e o célebre artigo de Garrett Hardin, publicado pela Science em 1968.

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A new theory of energy and the economy, Part 1
Generating economic growth
By Gail Tverberg
Posted on January 21, 2015

[...]

What if oil prices are artificially low, on a temporary basis? The catch is that not all costs of oil producing companies can be paid at such low prices. Perhaps the cost of operating oil fields still in existence will be fine, and the day-to-day expenses of extracting Middle Eastern oil can be covered. The parts of the chain that get squeezed first seem to be least essential on a day to day basis–taxes to governments, funds for new exploration, funds for debt repayments, and funds for dividends to policyholders.

Unfortunately, we cannot run the oil business on such a partial system. Businesses need to cover both their direct and indirect costs. Low oil prices create a system ready to crash, as oil production drops and the ability to leverage human labor with cheaper sources of energy decreases. Raising oil prices back to the full required level is likely to be a problem in the future, because oil companies require debt to finance new oil production. (This new production is required to offset declines in existing fields.) With low oil prices–or even with highly variable oil prices–the amount that can be borrowed drops and interest costs rise. This combination makes new investment impossible.

If the rising cost of energy products, due to diminishing returns, tends to eliminate economic growth, how do we work around the problem? In order to produce economic growth, it is necessary to produce goods in such a way that goods become cheaper and cheaper over time, relative to wages. Clearly this has not been happening recently.

The temptation businesses face in trying to produce this effect is to eliminate workers completely–just automate the process. This doesn’t work, because it is workers who need to be able to buy the products. Governments need to become huge, to manage transfer payments to all of the unemployed workers. And who will pay all of these taxes?

The popular answer to our diminishing returns problem is more efficiency, but efficiency rarely adds more than 1% to 2% to economic growth. We have been working hard on efficiency in recent years, but overall economic growth results have not been very good in the US, Europe, and Japan.

Artigo completo


A new theory of energy and the economy, Part 2
Charts showing the long-term GDP-energy tie
By Gail Tverberg
Posted on February 5, 2015

The high oil prices–around $100 per barrel–continued until United States QE was tapered down and stopped in 2014. About the same time, China made changes that made debt more difficult to obtain. Both of these factors, as well as the long-term adverse impact of $100 per barrel oil prices on the economy, brought oil price down to its current level, which is around $50 per barrel (Figure 10). The $50 per barrel price is still very high relative to the cost of oil when our infrastructure was built, but low relative to the current cost of oil production.

[...]

Where Does the World Economy Go From Here?

In Part 1, I described the world’s economy as one that is based on energy. The design of the system is such that the economy can only grow; shrinkage tends to cause collapse. If my view of the situation is correct, then we need an ever-rising amount of  inexpensive energy to keep the system going. We have gone from trying to grow the world economy on oil, to trying to grow the world economy on coal. Both of these approaches have “hit walls”. There are other low-income countries that might increase industrial production, such as in Africa, but they are lacking coal or other cheap fuels to fuel their production.

Now we have practically nowhere to go. Natural gas cannot be scaled up quickly enough, or to large enough quantities. If such a large scale up were done, natural gas would be expensive as well. Part of the high cost is the cost of the change-over in infrastructure, including huge amounts of new natural gas pipeline and new natural gas powered vehicles.

New renewables, such as wind and solar photovoltaic panels, aren’t solutions either. They tend to be high cost when indirect costs, such as the cost of long distance transmission and the cost of mitigating intermittency, are considered. It is hard to create large enough quantities of new renewables: China has been rapidly adding wind capacity, but the impact of these additions can barely can be seen at the top of Figure 14. Without supporting systems, such as roads and electricity transmission lines (which depend on oil), we cannot operate the electric systems that these devices are part of for the long term, either.

We truly live in interesting times.

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A new theory of energy and the economy, Part 3
The Problem of Debt as We Reach Oil Limits
By Gail Tverberg
Posted on February 11, 2015

Many readers have asked me to explain debt. They also wonder, “Why can’t we just cancel debt and start over?” if we are reaching oil limits, and these limits threaten to destabilize the system. To answer these questions, I need to talk about the subject of promises in general, not just what we would call debt.

In some sense, debt and other promises are what hold together our networked economy. Debt and other promises allow division of labor, because each person can “pay” the others in the group for their labor with a promise of some sort, rather than with an immediate payment in goods. The existence of debt allows us to have many convenient forms of payment, such as dollar bills, credit cards, and checks. Indirectly, the many convenient forms of payment allow trade and even international trade.

Each debt, and in fact each promise of any sort, involves two parties. From the point of view of one party, the commitment is to pay a certain amount (or certain amount plus interest). From the point of view of the other party, it is a future benefit–an amount available in a bank account, or a paycheck, or a commitment from a government to pay unemployment benefits. The two parties are in a sense bound together by these commitments, in a way similar to the way atoms are bound together into molecules. We can’t get rid of debt without getting rid of the benefits that debt provides–something that is a huge problem.

There has been much written about past debt bubbles and collapses. The situation we are facing today is different. In the past, the world economy was growing, even if a particular area was reaching limits, such as too much population relative to agricultural land. Even if a local area collapsed, the rest of the world could go on without them. Now, the world economy is much more networked, so a collapse in one area affects other areas as well. There is much more danger of a widespread collapse.

Our economy is built on economic growth. If the amount of goods and services produced each year starts falling, then we have a huge problem. Repaying loans becomes much more difficult.

In fact, in an economic contraction, promises that aren’t debt, such as promises to pay pensions and medical costs of the elderly as part of our taxes, become harder to pay as well. The amount we have left over for discretionary expenditures becomes much less. These pressures tend to push an economy further toward contraction, and make new promises even harder to repay.

[...]

Governments of “advanced” countries now have debt levels that are high by historical standards. If there is another major financial crisis, the plan seems to be to use Cyprus-like bail-ins of banks, instead of bailing out banks using government debt. In a bail-in, bank deposits are exchanged for equity in the failing bank. For example, in Cyprus, 37.5% of deposits in excess of 100,000 euros were converted to Class A shares in the bank.

[...)

The economy, as it exists today, has been made possible by countries working together. With sanctions against Iran and Russia, we are already moving away from this situation. Low oil prices are now putting the economies of oil exporters at risk. As countries try different approaches on interest rates, this adds yet another force, pulling economies apart.

[...]

Conclusion

If the current economic system crashes and it becomes necessary to create a new one, the new system will have to deal with having an ever-smaller amount of goods and services available for a fairly long transition time. This is one chart I have shown in the past of how the growth in energy products, and thus growth in goods and services, might look.

Because of this, the new system will have to be very different from the current one. Most promises will need to be of short duration.  Transfers among people living in a particular area might still be facilitated by a financial system, but it would be hard to have long-term or long-distance contracts. As a result, the new economy will likely need to be much simpler than our current economy. It is doubtful it could include fossil fuels.

Many people ask why we can’t just cancel all debt, and start over again. To do so would probably mean canceling all bank accounts as well. Most of our current jobs would probably disappear. We would probably be without grid electricity and without oil for cars. It would be very difficult to start over from such a situation. We would truly have to start over from scratch.

I have not talked about a distinction between “borrowed funds” and “accumulated equity”. Such a distinction is important in terms of the rate of return investors expect, but it is not as important in a crash situation. Similarly, the difference between stocks, bonds, pension plans, and insurance contracts becomes less important as well. If there are real problems, anything that is not physical ends up in the general category of “paper wealth”.

We cannot count on paper wealth (or for that matter, any wealth) for the long term. Each year, the amount of goods and services the economy can produce is limited by how the economy is performing, given limits we are reaching. If the quantity of these goods and services starts falling rapidly, governments may fail in addition to our problems with debts defaulting. Those holding paper wealth can’t count on getting very much. Workers producing whatever goods and services are actually being produced will likely need to be paid first.

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Paulo Morais ou Marinho Pinto?

Paulo Morais
De uma foto original de Lucília Monteiro@Expresso

Paulo Morais tem a idade certa para avançar

Ao contrário de Marinho Pinto, não arrasta rabos de palha

Paulo Morais testa novo partido
Expresso, 8:00 Sábado, 14 de fevereiro de 2015

“Paulo Morais começa por responder à defesa: “Estou a preparar qualquer coisa. O quê? Não sei.” Mas rapidamente se liberta e conta ao Expresso que de facto quer ter “uma intervenção política ativa”. O ex-número dois de Rui Rio na câmara do Porto tem uma certeza - quer voltar à política ativa - e um calendário definido: a decisão sobre o quê e como fará terá de ser tomada em breve, “até março”. O timing parece escolhido a pensar nas legislativas, mas Paulo Morais não o confirma.”

Seria bom que Paulo Morais conseguisse congregar à sua volta, numa nova e ampla plataforma democrática, numa Convergência de Ideias e Gerações, os vários movimentos dispersos que se têm vindo a formar contra uma nomenclatura partidária que se deixou corromper pelos corredores parlamentares, governamentais e autárquicos, que criou teias de interesses sórdidos com o poder financeiro incompetente, corrupto e insolvente que assalta as poupanças de quem trabalhou uma vida inteira, em suma, contra quem ainda ocupa os edifícios da democracia fechando-se dentro deles a sete chaves, para benefício próprio e da corte que a acompanha.

O regime que esta elite sem vergonha foi deformando à medida das suas conveniências está hoje à beira do colapso, e só se reformará quando esta mesma elite for expulsa das torres de marfim que não são suas.

Nas próximas eleições não podemos votar uma vez mais nos que criaram a crise.

Ou não votamos, ou votamos em quem for capaz de, entretanto, trazer para a mesa da discussão democrática ideias claras sobre como levantar a canga da dívida que tem vindo a esmagar a nossa economia e as nossas vidas.

Os partidos do Bloco Central, coadjuvados pelo PCP, empurraram Portugal para o lixo, e não apresentaram até agora soluções credíveis para sairmos da escravidão da dívida. Enquanto não expurgarem de si mesmos os ativos tóxicos e a corrupção entranhada, não serão capazes, nem de tirar o país da miséria, nem sequer de participar em soluções que outros proponham aos portugueses e em quem o país confie para as aplicar.

Precisamos de imaginação e coragem para desenhar e adotar um mecanismo inovador de resolução do gravíssimo desequilíbrio das nossas contas públicas, que rejeite de vez o serviço da dívida como canga de uma austeridade sem fim à vista e inaceitável grilhão do crescimento e emprego.

Precisamos, como do pão para a boca, de um compromisso social claro que mantenha e refresque o essencial do estado social, trave a corrupção, desburocratize o estado, acabe com o acosso fiscal contra os mais fracos, e garanta o controlo das contas públicas, a transparência democrática e as condições de um crescimento sustentável.

Precisamos de refundar constitucionalmente a nossa democracia, revendo e simplificando profundamente o nosso texto consensual. E precisamos ainda de expurgar das nossas leis todas as manhas que foram sendo introduzidas, ao longo das últimas décadas, para defesa dos rendeiros, devoristas e corruptos sistémicos do regime.

Os que nos trouxeram até ao desastre, ou que consentiram o desastre, não têm nem moral, nem vontade, nem competência para propor soluções. As suas receitas são conhecidas, velhas e não servem!

Michael Pettis e a crise da dívida europeia

Bismarck e Napoleão III depois da Batalha de Sedan

Plano Varoufakis: trocar a dívida existente por obrigações indexadas ao crescimento (é melhor que nada!)

“Because the major parties have refused to acknowledge the nature of this allocation process, and have turned it into a fight between a creditor Germany, on the one hand, and indebted peripheral European countries on the other, I was able to make in 2010-11 one of the easiest predictions I have ever made in my career — whichever extremist parties, whether of the right or of the left, who first went on the offensive against Germany, the bankers and the currency bureaucrats, I predicted, would surge in electoral popularity and would eventually reformulate the debate”— Michael Pettis.

Se nenhum partido do centro enfrentar a crise das dívidas europeias, nomeadamente em países da zona euro como a Irlanda, Grécia, Espanha, Portugal, Itália e França, a extrema-esquerda, ou a extrema-direita, chegará ao poder com mandato popular para o fazer. Se serão ou não capazes de cumprir a missão, e com que consequências, é algo que iremos começar a perceber ao longo das próximas semanas e meses depois da vitória democrática do Syriza na Grécia. Algo parece já ter perturbado, como nada até agora o fizera, o status quo apodrecido da nomenclatura que mal tem dirigido os destinos económicos, financeiros, sociais e diplomáticos da União Europeia.

Para os que se interessam por estas coisas, o post viral de Michael Pettis(1) sobre o pouco científico jogo de passa culpas entre os credores e os devedores europeus merece uma leitura atenta por parte de quem busque uma resposta ao que parece ser a quadratura do círculo: como resolver as gigantescas dívidas públicas e privadas que começaram a paralisar inúmeros países e economias, sem destruir os devedores, nem os credores?

Para efeitos de simplificação narrativa, os credofres são protagonizados pela Alemanha, e os devedores, pela Espanha. Ao longo do seu longo post Pettis explica como Wolfgang Schaeuble não teve nenhuma razão quando afirmou —logo papagueado pelos nossos infelizes PM e PR— que

“The reasons for Greece’s problems can be attributable only to Greece and not to actors outside the country, and certainly not in Germany.”

O artigo de Pettis recua até à Guerra Franco-Prussiana de 1870-1871, que deu a Bismarck uma grande oportunidade, ao vencer os franceses, de avançar decisivamente para a unificação alemã. A derrota da França, por sua vez, não só acabou com o regime decadente de Napoleão III, não só instaurou a III República francesa, como foi palco de uma das maiores indemnizações de guerra integralmente pagas de que há registo: cinco mil milhões de francos de ouro—23% do PIB francês(2).

O pedido inicial de indemnização teria sido de mil milhões, mas os alemães resolveram aumentar astronomicamente este valor nos termos finais do Tratado de Frankfurt, pretendendo assim colocar a França economicamente de rastos, sem fôlego para perturbar o caminho da jovem nação alemã. Para surpresa de todos, dos mercados, e certamente dos alemães, o prazo imposto para a liquidação da dívida —3 anos— foi antecipado em um ano pelo sucesso de duas emissões de dívida soberana francesa cuja procura largamente superou a oferta.

Mas o mais extraordinário é que o afluxo desta pipa de massa —para usar uma expressão recente de Durão Barroso a propósito do Acordo de Parceria 2014-2020— acabaria por lançar a Alemanha na sua primeira Grande Depressão (1873). Foi neste ano que nasceu o Deutsche Bank, o mesmo que hoje tem uma exposição aos derivados financeiros de 54,7 biliões de euros, quase 20x o PIB alemão, quase 6x o PIB da UE. Se apenas 10% desta exposição acabar em default, quem irá ensopar então um buraco de dívidas equivalente a duas vezes o PIB alemão?

De quem foi a culpa?

Dos franceses que pagaram as indemnizações de guerra, ou da Alemanha que usou o dinheiro como os PIIGS, em parte, desperdiçaram fundos comunitários e investimento estrangeiro em autoestradas para lado nenhum, barragens inúteis, rotundas idiotas e um Mercedes à porta de cada Câmara Municipal, ou ainda férias em praias exóticas, como se não tivessemos mais de 1800 Km de costa marítima?

O post de Michael Pettis vem na linha da sua tese de que as grandes crises de gestão dos défices e das dívidas têm frequentemente, pelo menos na sua fase inicial, causas externas. Neste sentido, quando as mesmas ficam fora de controlo, a melhor saída possível para devedores e credores pode exigir a anulação parcial das dívidas e a reestruturação.

Mas não é isto que o BCE tem vindo a fazer na Eurolândia salvando, desde logo, os bancos da famosa crise sistémica? Não tem havido abatimentos parciais, extensões de prazos e reduções sucessivas de juros nalgumas dívidas públicas? Sim, mas Pettis afirma que a fatura tem sido enviada sobretudo aos trabalhadores e à classe média, com prejuízos graves para um eventual regresso ao crescimento.

Defende, assim, que seria melhor uma ação de reestuturação clara das dívidas, em vez de prolongar as meias medidas, a indecisão, e sobretudo a agonia social que trava o regresso ao crescimento e, desde logo, a confiança dos mercados! 

Aviso final aos portugueses

Nas próximas eleições não podemos votar uma vez mais nos que criaram a crise. Ou não votamos, ou votamos em quem for capaz de, entretanto, trazer para a mesa da discussão democrática ideias claras sobre como levantar a canga da dívida que tem vindo a esmagar a nossa economia e as nossas vidas.

Os partidos do Bloco Central empurraram Portugal para o lixo, e não apresentaram até agora soluções credíveis para sairmos da escravidão da dívida. Enquanto não expurgarem de si mesmos os ativos tóxicos e a corrupção entranhada não serão capazes, nem de tirar o país da miséria para que caminha, nem sequer de participar em soluções que outros proponham aos portugueses e em quem o país confie para as aplicar.

Precisamos de imaginação e coragem para desenhar e adotar um mecanismo novo de resolução da dívida pública portuguesa, que não seja um grilhão inibidor do crescimento e do emprego, mas um compromisso social claro que trave a corrupção e garanta o controlo das contas públicas, a transparência e as condições de um crescimento sustentável.

---

Toulouse-Lautrec. O Fotógrafo, Place pigeon, 9 (1894)

Syriza and the French indemnity of 1871-73
By Michael Pettis · February 4, 2015
CHINA FINANCIAL MARKETS

“...the current European crisis is boringly similar to nearly every currency and sovereign debt crisis in modern history.”

— extratos

[...]

“Except for Greece, in Europe the main political parties on both sides of the political spectrum have until now chosen to maintain the value of the currency and protect the interests of the creditors. It has been the extremist parties, either on the right or the left, who have attacked the currency union and the interests of the creditors. In many cases these parties are extreme nationalists and oppose the existence of the European Union. If they succeed in taking control of the debate, the European experiment will almost certainly collapse, and it will take decades, if ever, for a European union to revive.

But while distortions in the savings rate are at the root of the European crisis, many if not most analysts have failed to understand why. Until now, an awful lot of Europeans have understood the crisis primarily in terms of differences in national character, economic virtue, and as a moral struggle between prudence and irresponsibility. This interpretation is intuitively appealing but it is almost wholly incorrect, and because the cost of saving Europe is debt forgiveness, and Europe must decide if this is a cost worth paying (I think it is), to the extent that the European crisis is seen as a struggle between the prudent countries and the irresponsible countries, it is extremely unlikely that Europeans will be willing to pay the cost. As my regular readers know, I generally refer to the two different groups of creditor and debtor countries as “Germany” and “Spain”, the former for obvious reasons and the latter because I was born and grew up there, and it is the country I know best. I will continue to do so in this blog entry.”

[...]

“It is useful to remember this history when we confront the consequences of Greece’s recent elections. Syriza’s victory in Greece has reignited the name-calling and moralizing that has characterized much of the discussion on peripheral Europe’s unsustainable debt burden. I think it is pretty clear, and obvious to almost everyone, that Greece simply cannot repay its external obligations, and one way or another it is going to receive substantial debt forgiveness. There isn’t even much pretence at this point. This morning financial advisor Mish Shedlock, sent me (as a joke? as a sign of despair?) German newspaper Zeit‘s interview with Yanis Varoufakis entitled “I’m the Finance Minister of a Bankrupt Country”.

Even if the question of who is to “blame”, Greece or Germany, were an important one, the answer would not change the debt dynamics. It would take the equivalent of Ceausescu’s brutal austerity policies in Romania, which were imposed during the 1980s in order for the country fully to repay its external debt, to resolve the Greek debt burden without a write-down. Given that Ceausescu’s policies led directly to the 1989 revolution, which culminated in both Ceausescu and his wife being executed by firing squad, the reluctance in Athens to imitate Romania in the 1980s is probably not surprising.”

[...]

“If the restructuring is well designed, within a year of the restructuring I think we could easily see Greek growth surprise us with its vigor. I was delighted to see that Greece’s new Finance minister agrees. An article in Monday’s Financial Times starts with the claim that “Greece’s radical new government revealed proposals on Monday for ending the confrontation with its creditors by swapping outstanding debt for new growth-linked bonds, running a permanent budget surplus and targeting wealthy tax-evaders.” Today’s Financial Times has an article by Martin Wolf that mentions the benefits of “a growth linked bond”. In The Volatility Machine I spend chapters explaining how to create liability structures that minimize external shocks, align the interests of creditors and citizens, and improve the quality of payments for creditors, and I show why these make a restructuring much more successful for all parties concerned. This is just basic finance theory. Yanis Varoufakis should really take the lead in designing an entirely new form of sovereign debt restructuring, not just for Greece but for the many countries, in Europe and elsewhere, that will soon follow it into default.

Enough people seem to hate or fear Syriza that there will be little attempt to approach Greece’s problems with enough imagination to give either party what it needs, but in fact with the right cooperation, imagination, and intuitive understanding of how balance sheet structures change overall value creation, a Greek debt restructuring could leave both sides far better off than either side might imagine. Of course if done right this matters far more than for just its impact on the Greek economy. While everyone probably agrees that Greece simply cannot proceed without debt forgiveness, less widely agreed, but no less obvious in my opinion, is that there are a number of other European countries that also need debt forgiveness if they are to grow. Because I was born and grew up in Spain, and my French mother founded and ran a successful business there which my family and I still own, I am confident that I know the country well enough to say that even with some impressive reforms having been implemented under Mariano Rajoy, Spain is nonetheless one of these countries. I suspect that many other countries including Portugal, Italy, and maybe even France are too.

I also know, however, that Spanish debt prospects are an extremely sensitive and emotional topic, and I will be roundly condemned for saying this. Today’s Financial Times has a very worrying article explaining why Madrid wants to be seen among the hardliners in opposing a rational treatment for Greece: “when it comes to helping Greece, there will be no such thing as southern solidarity or peripheral patronage.” This is the reverse of what it should be doing. In an article for Politica Exterior in January 2012, I actually proposed, albeit without much hope, that Spain take the lead and organize the debtor countries to negotiate a sustainable agreement, but in its fear of Podemos, the Spanish equivalent of Syriza, and its determination to be one of the “virtuous” countries, it strikes me that Madrid is probably moving in the wrong direction economically. Ultimately, by tying itself even more tightly to the interests of the creditors, Rajoy and his associates are only making the electoral prospects for Podemos all the brighter.”

[...]

“1.  There is no question that a renegotiation of Spanish debt or of its status within the currency union would be accompanied by economic hardship and perhaps even a crisis. But compared to what? The Spanish economy is already in disastrous shape and there is compelling historical evidence that countries suffering under excessive debt burdens can never grow their way out of their debt no matter how radical and forceful the reforms.”

[...]

“Some economists argue the facts on the ground already contradict my pessimism. Last week Madrid announced excitedly that GDP grew by 1.7% last year, its fastest pace in seven years. The Financial Times pointed out that Spain was well-positioned in 2015 to continue to take advantage of lower energy costs, a weaker euro, and a cut in personal and corporate taxes, to which I would add lower metal prices, massive QE, and stronger than expected consumption. But even if these tailwinds are permanent, and they clearly are not, nominal GDP growth is still much lower than the growth in the debt burden. This is as good as it gets, in other words, and it is not good enough. As the debt burden continues to climb, and as social and political frustrations mount, Spain will slide inexorably backwards into the backward-country status it wants so badly to avoid.”

[...]

“Above all this is not a story about nations. Before the crisis German workers were forced to pay to inflate the Spanish bubble by accepting very low wage growth, even as the European economy boomed. After the crisis Spanish workers were forced to absorb the cost of deflating the bubble in the form of soaring unemployment. But the story doesn’t end there. Before the crisis, German and Spanish lenders eagerly sought out Spanish borrowers and offered them unlimited amounts of extremely cheap loans — somewhere in the fine print I suppose the lenders suggested that it would be better if these loans were used to fund only highly productive investments.

But many of them didn’t, and because they didn’t, German and Spanish banks — mainly the German banks who originally exported excess German savings — must take very large losses as these foolish investments, funded by foolish loans, fail to generate the necessary returns. It is no great secret that banking systems resolve losses with the cooperation of their governments by passing them on to middle class savers, either directly, in the form of failed deposits or higher taxes, or indirectly, in the form of financial repression. Both German and Spanish banks must be recapitalized in order that they can eventually recognize the inevitable losses, and this means either many years of artificially boosted profits on the back of middle class savers, or the direct transfer of losses onto the government balance sheets, with German and Spanish household taxpayers covering the debt repayments.”

“I am not rejecting the claim that “Spain” acted irresponsibly, in other words, only to place the blame on “German” irresponsibility. But it is absolutely wrong for Volker Kauder, the parliamentary caucus leader of German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s Christian Democrats, to say, according to an article in last week’s Bloomberg, that “Germany bears no responsibility for what happened in Greece. The new prime minister must recognize that.” There was indeed plenty of irresponsible behavior on both sides, during which time wealth was transferred from workers of both countries to create the boom and to absorb the subsequent bust, and wealth will be transferred again from middle class households of both countries to clean up the resulting debt debacle.”

Put differently, there is no national virtue or national vice here, and there is no reason for the European crisis to devolve into right-wing, nationalist extremism. The financial crisis in Europe, like all financial crises, is ultimately a struggle about how the costs of the adjustment will be allocated, either to workers and middle class savers or to bankers, owners of real and financial assets, and the business elite. Because the major parties have refused to acknowledge the nature of this allocation process, and have turned it into a fight between a creditor Germany, on the one hand, and indebted peripheral European countries on the other, I was able to make in 2010-11 one of the easiest predictions I have ever made in my career — whichever extremist parties, whether of the right or of the left, who first went on the offensive against Germany, the bankers and the currency bureaucrats, I predicted, would surge in electoral popularity and would eventually reformulate the debate.”

[...]

“I think there are several points that those of us who want “Europe” to survive should be making.

1.  The euro crisis is a crisis of Europe, not of European countries. It is not a conflict between Germany and Spain (and I use these two countries to represent every European country on one side or the other of the boom) about who should be deemed irresponsible, and so should absorb the enormous costs of nearly a decade of mismanagement. There was plenty of irresponsible behavior in every country, and it is absurd to think that if German and Spanish banks were pouring nearly unlimited amounts of money into countries at extremely low or even negative real interest rates, especially once these initial inflows had set off stock market and real estate booms, that there was any chance that these countries would not respond in the way every country in history, including Germany in the 1870s and in the 1920s, had responded under similar conditions.

2.  The “losers” in this system have been German and Spanish workers, until now, and German and Spanish middle class savers and taxpayers in the future as European banks are directly or indirectly bailed out. The winners have been banks, owners of assets, and business owners, mainly in Germany, whose profits were much higher during the last decade than they could possibly have been otherwise

3.  In fact, the current European crisis is boringly similar to nearly every currency and sovereign debt crisis in modern history, in that it pits the interests of workers and small producers against the interests of bankers. The former want higher wages and rapid economic growth. The latter want to protect the value of the currency and the sanctity of debt.

4.  I am not smart enough to say with any confidence that one side or the other is right. There have been cases in history in which the bankers were probably right, and cases in which the workers were probably right. I can say, however, that the historical precedents suggest two very obvious things. First, as long as Spain suffers from its current debt burden, it does not matter how intelligently and forcefully it implements economic reforms. It will not be able to grow out of its debt burden and must choose between two paths. One path involves many, many more years of economic hell, as ordinary households are slowly forced to absorb the costs of debt — sometimes explicitly but usually implicitly in the form of financial repression, unemployment, and debt monetization.  The other path is a swift resolution of the debt as it is restructured and partially forgiven in a disruptive but short process, after which growth will return and almost certainly with vigor

5.  Second, it is the responsibility of the leading centrist parties to recognize the options explicitly. If they do not, extremist parties either of the right or the left will take control of the debate, and convert what is a conflict between different economic sectors into a nationalist conflict or a class conflict. If the former win, it will spell the end of the grand European experiment.”

NOTAS

1. Michael Pettis é o autor dum famoso livro publicado em 2001 —The Volatility Machine: Emerging Economics and the Threat of Financial Collapse— onde pela primeira vez se procura demonstrar, a propósito das crises de endividamento ocorridas na Argentina, países asiáticos emergentes, Rússia, e em geral desde 1820, que a perda de controlo sobre a gestão das dívidas soberanas tem tido uma origem sobretudo externa.
2. Para termos um termo de comparação que dá bem a ideia das enormidades cometidas pelo nosso, muito indígena, Bloco Central da Corrupção, as responsabilidades contraídas pelo estado português nos 120 contratos de Parcerias Público Privadas representam 35% do PIB. Parte dos 23% do PIB francês que voram para a jovem Alemanha regressariam sob a forma de investimento alemão, e muito dinheiro gasto no futuro Quartier Pigalle! Ou seja, o Capitalismo estava numa fase explosiva de crescimento, e as dívidas eram uma forma expedita de crescer rapidamente. Pelo contrário, quando Portugal se lançou na corrida do endividamento comunitário, os tempos já eram de fim de festa. Cada euro acrescentado à dívida pública e privada portuguesa seria um grilhão mais na cadeia que nos puxa cada vez o mais para o fundo do buraco.

Atualização: 15-02-2015 21:05 WET

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China quer os lombinhos do BES

Bank of China (ao centro). Hong-Kong.

Portugal, 1415—China, 2015 (600 anos depois...), ou a profecia de Xangai

Bank of China, "wholly state-owned", quer o lombo sem gorduras do exBES, o chamado 'banco bom', deixando obviamente milhares de antigos clientes com as poupanças a arder.

Bank of China é um dos interessados no Novo Banco
Dinheiro Vivo 14/02/2015 | 00:00

Está desvendado mais um nome entre os interessados no Novo Banco. O Bank of China está na corrida à instituição liderada por Eduardo Stock da Cunha, segundo apurou o Dinheiro Vivo. O banco chinês manifestou o seu interesse junto do assessor financeiro escolhido pelo Banco de Portugal que está a assessorar a venda - BNP Paribas - e já terá sido, inclusivamente, uma das entidades que foi validada. Ou seja, que cumpre os critérios exigidos pelo Banco de Portugal para aceder à informação financeira.

Não deixa de ser uma ironia, ou melhor uma farsa, que um país em bancarrota, como Portugal, dirigido por um governo dito neoliberal, esteja a despachar as suas principais empresas estratégicas, outrora públicas e hoje privadas, bancos incluídos, para o setor empresarial público da comunista República Popular da China. Os gregos, ao menos, usam a imaginação!

A estratégia chinesa é bem-vinda, sobretudo para o novo desenho das interdependências lusitanas, mas sob condição de os indígenas ignaros que nos governam saberem o que andam a fazer. Não sabem.

Neste ponto convém sublinhar que dos aldrabões do PSD e CDS, ao indigente cor-de-rosa que governa os Açores, o que transparece é tão só o afã de venda ao desbarato dos dedos da República Portuguesa. Os anéis, como sabemos hoje melhor do que ontem, marcharam com a descolonização maltrapilha e o tumulto pré-revolucionário que se seguiu à queda do Salazarismo.

Dizem os imbecis de Belém e de São Bento que Portugal cumpre com as suas obrigações perante os credores. Vê-se!!!

Zheng He (1371-1433)—almirante muçulmano, eunuco, chinês, considerado hoje o Grande Navegador da China

Um chinês de Xangai predisse uma vez que em 2015 o Império do Meio seria o banco do mundo. Curiosamente, seiscentos anos depois da conquista de Ceuta, que marca o início da grande diáspora marítima europeia e a primeira experiência de Globalização. A profecia de Xangai está a ponto de cumprir-se, embora, na minha modesta opinião, uma vez cumprida, terá vida curta. Antes de 2030 o mundo voltará a dividir-se ao meio: o hemisfério oriental, para uns, o hemisfério ocidental, para outros.

Esta fatalidade dever-se-à a duas ocorrências, uma imprevista, e outra inevitável.

A causa imprevista do fracasso futuro do projeto imperial chinês chama-se Pico do Petróleo, cujas implicações são muito complexas, mas que podem resumir-se a dois constrangimentos fulcrais: a chegada de um período longo (60 a 120 anos) de crescimento zero (entre 0 e 1%), e uma prolongada crise financeira, social, cultural e militar com origem na extrema dificuldade de diminuir os elevadíssimos níveis de endividamento e de exposição a derivados financeiros especulativos por parte da maioria dos principais países do planeta.

A causa inevitável, por sua vez, é o crescimento do consumo interno na China e a melhoria das condições de vida dos seus habitantes, a qual exercerá uma pressão enorme sobre os recursos disponíveis locais e do planeta, e uma pressão explosiva sobre a inflação interna enquanto o país não regredir para ritmos de crescimento substancialmente inferiores aos atuais, que, apesar de tudo, já começaram a diminuir.

Repetir a receita do Japão (yen carry-trade), que os próprios Estados Unidos têm vindo a copiar, afigura-se materialmente impossível apesar da guerra cambial e de juros em curso desde o colapso do Lehman Brothers. Haverá, pois, um momento em que os problemas internos da China serão mais importantes do que o sonho imperial. Quando tal acontecer, e esse dia está mais próximo do que parece, a China lembrar-se-à do imperador que ordenou a Zheng He a destruição da sua famosa e poderosa armada.

Que deve fazer Portugal?

Os dirigentes chineses afirmaram que a sua relação com Portugal, mas também com a Alemanha, o Reino Unido, a Grécia, Moçambique e Angola, Brasil, Argentina, etc., é de natureza estratégica. Ou seja, que visa o longo prazo e os interesses comuns. Acredito que sim. E Portugal deve cuidar com zelo desta relação estratégica. Mas não enfraquecendo a tal ponto as suas defesas naturais que se transforme numa mera província chinesa na Europa.


NOTAS

1. Bank of China
   “In 1994, the Bank was transformed into a wholly state-owned commercial bank. In August 2004, Bank of China Limited was incorporated. The Bank was listed on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange and Shanghai Stock Exchange in June and July 2006 respectively, becoming the first Chinese commercial bank to launch an A-Share and H-Share initial public offering and achieve a dual listing in both markets. In 2013, Bank of China was enrolled again as a Global Systemically Important Bank, becoming the sole financial institution from emerging economies to be enrolled for three consecutive years.”

Esqueçam o petróleo!

Boa parte do petróleo que alimentou o séc. 20 e alimentará talvez metade do séc. 21 vem da era dos dinossauros, i.e. de há 250 milhões de anos atrás. E está no fim!

Peak Oil is the “new normal”

A euforia fabricada em volta do petróleo e do gás de xisto obtidos por fratura de rochas de xisto —fracking— não passa de uma e derradeira tentativa de esconder o impacto tremendo que o Pico do Petróleo terá (já está a a ter) na evolução humana. Todos os conflitos militares atualmente em curso, de que o terrorismo é apenas a sua face mais horrendamente visível, têm origem nas disputas geoestratégicas para controlar o que resta de reservatórios naturais de petróleo e gás natural de boa qualidade e relativamente acessíveis. É que abaixo dos 60-80 dólares o barril as explorações são pura e simplesmente deficitárias, e acima dos 100 dólares as economias deixam de crescer saudavelmente, i.e. sem recurso a formas de endividamento insustentável e especulativo.

The global “new normal” é isto: crescimento débil, queda persistente dos rendimentos do trabalho, elevado desemprego estrutural e estagnação da criação de novos empregos, pelo menos enquanto não mudarmos de paradigma económico, social e cultural.

No entanto, dada a correlação existente nos EUA entre petróleo barato e crescimento de salários é possível que o fracking seja uma tentativa desesperada de inverter a queda imparável dos rendimentos de 99% dos americanos à custa de uma mistificação necessariamente temporária e precária.

Oil, the economy’s central power source, is now insufficient for 3% economic growth
Aleklett’s Energy Mix. Posted on January 28, 2015

“If we look back to 2004, the International Energy Agency (IEA) stated that increased economic growth of 3% per year required increased oil consumption of around 1.5%. Looking forward, the IEA predicted that, due to economic growth, in 2030 oil production would need to be 122 million barrels per day (Mb/d). Some weeks later I did an analysis that showed that their predictions could never be realised, i.e. the fuel for the expected economic growth could not be supplied at the rate required (TheUppsalaCode).

Now the IEA has adjusted its prognosis so that, for 2030, it describes a rate of oil production (without processing gane) of 92 Mb/d, i.e. a reduction of 30 Mb/d compared to its earlier forecast. Historically, we have never seen global economic growth without increased consumption of oil. During the 1960s the rate of increase in oil use was 8% per year. From the mid-1980s until 2005 we saw an increase of 1.6% per year. In November 2014 the IEA stated that it was optimistic that there would be an increase in oil use of 0.5% per year until 2035. This is a very significant contraction from earlier forecasts but the significance of this has so far not been understood by politicians and economists.

Our economy is not configured to cope with decreased oil use. We still need oil to transport the goods we wish to purchase/consume (including food) and to drive the vehicles that take us to where those goods are sold. If the coupling between economic growth and oil use is similar now to as it was during the 1980s and 1990s then we cannot expect more than 1% annual economic growth in future, and maybe less.”

Alguns gráficos e referência que merecem atenção

Correlação entre preço do petróleoe salários nos EUA

“A new theory of energy and the economy – Part 1 – Generating economic growth”. By Gail Tverberg, in Our Finite World, Posted on January 21, 2015.

“World Energy Consumption Since 1820 in Charts”. By Gail Tverberg, in Our Finite World.

Que tal resgatar as PPP?

As autoestradas para lugar nenhum do Bloco Central da Corrupção

Das 120 PPP existentes —que representam qualquer coisa como 35% do PIB, algumas deveriam ir imediatamente à vida, e outras renegociadas duramente.

Nota: incluir este tema no debate eleitoral em curso

Que tal resgatar as PPP? Que tal incluir as suas responsabilidades, depois de refinanciadas no mercado, a juros de 2,0...%, em vez dos 6% que os rendeiros da Brisa e quejandos usuram, na dívida pública (reciclada)?

Que tal denunciar todas as cláusulas de indemnizações compensatórias abusivas, apertando a sério a fiscalização dos contratos das PPP, indemnizando os rendeiros só e apenas na justa medida da Justiça, usando para tal uma emissão de dívida pública dedicada?

Seria possível remunerar os futuros tomadores desta dívida dedicada e desarmar a bomba-relógio das PPP— contratos especulativos congeminados e armadilhados pelo Bloco Central da Corrupção.

Que tal atacar de vez e a sério o escândalo das rendas excessivas com que o Bloco Central da Corrupção atirou o país ao lixo?

O mote está lançado:

IVO GONÇALVES: “Há entretanto uma possibilidade de reestruturação do nosso orçamento, já em  tempos aventada, que poderia ser também seguida, em alternativa ou cumulativamente ao pagamento antecipado ao FMI – o resgate das PPP (parcerias público privadas) sobretudo as das vias de comunicação, articulada ou não com a nacionalização das respectivas sociedades veículo.

A troika deu uma no cravo e outra na ferradura, falando na necessidade de diminuir as rendas mas respeitando as expectativas, bla, bla….As negociações do actual Governo conseguiram cortar  algumas dezenas de km de construção nova (nuns casos bem, noutros mal) , a conservação e pouco mais.

Fazer passar as infraestruturas para o Estado ou para sociedades de capitais exclusivamente públicos,  que renegociariam com o Estado os contratos, reduzindo as rentabilidades exageradas, seria acompanhado pela  emissão de dívida pública para compensar os actuais parceiros. Hoje em dia a nova dívida pública portuguesa colocada em mercado primário tem taxas a 10 e a 30 anos que poderiam servir pacificamente de referência.

No conjunto teríamos uma dívida pública acrescida, mas com reembolso a longo prazo, e aumentaria o valor total dos juros pagos anualmente. Mas em contrapartida as despesas do Estado com as “rendas” das PPP ficariam substancialmente reduzidas.”

in Comunicar

Atualização: 14/2/2015 17:44 WET

Alemanha aprova 'fracking'

Um campo de 'fracking' no Canadá
Foto: Simon Fraser University

A Alemanha faz o que quer e sobra-lhe tempo. Sobrará?

Governo alemão aprova a criminosa indústria de fracking no seu território—para explorar gás!

Não teria sido melhor ter desenvolvido uma diplomacia inteligente com a Rússia, a Turquia, Grécia e Chipre, em vez de andar a reboque das estratégias imperiais dos insolventes americanos?

E já agora, não deveria a União Europeia discutir o assunto previamente, dado o precedente que gera para os restantes governos da União Europeia? Ou é só para o que interessa à Alemanha que os assuntos descem aos indigentes burocratas de Bruxelas?

O fracking mede de forma clara a chegada do Pico do Petróleo. Não existe prova mais cabal das previsões de Hubbert (1956). Mas neste caso específico, a decisão alemã, que conta também com o apoio dos sociais-democratas, mede sobretudo o grau de pânico existente no setor energético alemão em resultado da sua desatrosa política de alianças.

German government approves fracking
EurActiv. Published: 13/02/2015 - 07:08

The German government has tabled a draft law permitting fracking in the country, with environmental associations criticising the draft as fragmented and risky, calling on the government to concentrate on implementing the Energiewende, instead. EurActiv Germany reports.

After a long debate over the use of fracking technology in Germany, the federal government issued a draft law allowing the controversial gas extraction method under certain conditions and in isolated cases.

German Environment Minister Barbara Hendricks made every effort to dispel concerns over the controversial gas extraction technology. “In this way, we are applying the strictest rules that have ever existed in the fracking industry,” the Social Democratic Party (SPD) politician assured.

It will only be permitted under the strictest conditions and with the highest regard for the environment and drinking water, she said. The earliest possible date for initiation would be in 2019, because sample drillings must first be conducted to gather the necessary knowledge on the technology, Hendricks explained.