Tag: im13

Boxing Clever

Containers have been more important for globalisation than freer trade…
The humble hero, Economist, 18 May 2013
The world’s largest container ships make it easy to appreciate the economies of scale that allow a T-shirt made in China to be sent to the Netherlands for just 2.5 cents…
Economies of scale made steel, The Economist, 12 Nov 2011

The Box: How the Shipping Container Made the World Smaller and the World Economy Bigger, Mark Levinson, Princeton University Press (2008)

Globalising the Yuan

CCB issues ‘dim-sum’ bonds in London, Financial Times, 30 Nov 2012
Reserve currencies: Climbing greenback mountain, The Economist, 24 Sep 2011
London to develop as Chinese yuan trading hub, BBC News, 8 Sep 2011
Yuan will be fully convertible by 2015, Bloomberg news, 8 Sep 2011
Central Bank Governor Sanusi says Nigeria plans to get yuan to 10% of reserves as soon as possible, Bloomberg news, 7 Sep 2011
China sells retail bonds in offshore yuan mkt at 1.6 pct, Reuters, 17 August 2011

The Great Rebalancing

Imbalances and the subsequent deluge of volatile capital flows are widely cited as core contributors to the global financial crisis. Current account imbalances, partly reflecting excess savings in Asia, are commonly cited as a culprit. However, some argue that the rise in cross-border lending, a “global banking glut”, may have been more culpable for the crisis than the “global savings glut”.

Bernanke, Ben S. (2005) “The Global Saving Glut and the U.S. Current Account Deficit“, Remarks at the Sandridge Lecture, Virginia Association of Economists, Richmond, Virginia, March 10, 2005,
Borio, Claudio and Piti Disyatat (2011) “Global imbalances and the financial crisis: Link or no link?” BIS Working Paper 346
Shin, Hyun Song (2011) “Global Banking Glut and Loan Risk Premium” 2011 Mundell-Fleming Lecture

ECB Executive Board member Peter Praet offers an optimistic view on recent structural reforms and the associated rebalancing of domestic and external flows…
The “Great Rebalancing” of the euro area and the global economy, ECB Keynote speech, 30 Nov 2012

Somewhat more pessimistic about EU bank deleveraging is …
Global savings glut or global banking glut? VoxEU, 20 Dec 2011