Fri 2010-10-08 20:54 EDT
BofA Halts All Foreclosure Sales - WSJ.com
Bank of America is placing a moratorium on all foreclosure proceedings and sales in the U.S., amid political pressure on U.S. banks to examine foreclosure-documentation problems.
Political pressure Topic in The Credit Debacle Catalog
triggered rising political pressure (1).
Tue 2010-04-20 10:58 EDT
Get the Yuan Right, Prove Pundits Wrong: Hype over an 'imminent' increase in yuan value ignores China's greater need for higher interest rates and fewer bubbles
Unless China exits its economic stimulus quickly, the nation's inflation rate could rise to double digit levels sooner than many expect. The right sequence of events for a proper response to inflation would be to raise interest rates and then, if necessary, move the yuan exchange rate. But acting on the currency first, especially in small steps, would further inflate China's property bubble and inflation, potentially leading to a major economic crisis in two years. A small increase in the yuan's value would fail to resolve two pressing problems: inflationary pressure at home, and political pressure from the United States. Moreover, a small appreciation would attract hot money, stoking inflationary pressure...
bubble; higher interest rate; hype; imminent; increased; proving pundits wrong; Yuan right; yuan value ignores China's greater need.
Thu 2009-10-08 17:10 EDT
Recovering from Neoliberal Disaster - Why Iceland and Latvia Won't (and Can't) Pay
Can Iceland and Latvia pay the foreign debts run up by a fairly narrow layer of their population? The European Union and International Monetary Fund have told them to replace private debts with public obligations, and to pay by raising taxes, slashing public spending and obliging citizens to deplete their savings. Resentment is growing not only toward those who ran up these debts -- Iceland's bankrupt Kaupthing and Landsbanki with its Icesave accounts, and heavily debt-leveraged property owners and privatizers in the Baltics and Central Europe -- but also toward the neoliberal foreign advisors and creditors who pressured these governments to sell off the banks and public infrastructure to insiders. Support in Iceland for joining the EU has fallen to just over a third of the population, while Latvia's Harmony Center party, the first since independence to include a large segment of the Russian-speaking population, has gained a majority in Riga and is becoming the most popular national party. Popular protests in both countries have triggered rising political pressure to limit the debt burden to a reasonable ability to pay...