Czyli problem wypłacalności:
Until last summer, serious people were marveling that credit was cheap because the world, oddly enough, enjoyed a ``savings glut,'' as Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke put it. Despite the huge demand for credit from China, India, private industry, American consumers and the U.S. government, unlimited credit was somehow on offer at low interest rates.
But now we know what really occurred. Banks were increasingly moving loans off their books by creating exotic bonds. By selling off those bonds, they could use the proceeds to make more loans.
In effect, the private financial system was printing money, operating beyond regulatory constraints (which limit the ratio of loans to bank capital.) Because these loans were sold, they were unlimited. But the newly minted ``money'' was only as good as its collateral.
Once investors began examining that collateral -- a murky stew of sub-prime mortgages, high-risk credit card debt, used car loans, and other exotic securities created to insure these dubious bonds -- they saw a financial house of cards. As confidence collapsed with falling housing prices, so did the credit system.
Czyli klasyczna piramida finansowa: kręci się dopóki mało kto się połapał jak działa. Powyższy fragment jest przedrukiem z tekstu Roberta Kuttnera. Zwracam uwagę na datę publikacji: grudzień 2007. Teraz skoro to jest problem wypłacalności (a nie płynności czy braku zaufania banków do siebie, jak niektórzy ``eksperci'' usiłują to przedstawić publiczności), to kuracja pn. obniżanie stóp procentowych banków centralnych nie leczy choroby tylko odracza zgon o czas jakiś... Proste jak metr sznurka.
