News & Commentary:

Articles/Commentary

Coronavirus unmasks vulnerability of bull run
FT View Mar 1, 2020
Policymakers must beware the market rout becoming a credit crunch.

What can macro policymakers do about coronavirus?
Gavyn Davies (FT) Mar 1, 2020
The global economy faces a demand shock focused on services and consumer spending.

The UK's threat to walk out of EU trade talks is real
Wolfgang Münchau (FT) Mar 1, 2020
London and Brussels have both turned these negotiations into a zero-sum game.

The Coronavirus Has Put the World's Economy in Survival Mode
Eswar S. Prasad (NYT) Mar 1, 2020
There's little hope for a global economic rebound in 2020.

The Good, the Bad and the Ugly of the Coronavirus Response
Mohamed A. El-Erian (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 1, 2020
Governments and central banks can do only so much.

The Long, Good Life
Andrew Scott (F&D) Mar 1, 2020
Longer, more productive lives will mean big changes to the old rules of aging.

Reversing Demographic Decline
Poh Lin Tan (F&D) Mar 1, 2020
Singapore's experience in trying to raise its fertility rate offers lessons for other countries.

Shrinkonomics: Lessons from Japan
Gee Hee Hong and Todd Schneider (F&D) Mar 1, 2020
Japan is the world's laboratory for drawing policy lessons on aging, dwindling populations.

Getting Older but Not Poorer
David Amaglobeli, Era Dabla-Norris, and Vitor Gaspar (F&D) Mar 1, 2020
As societies age worldwide, pensions and public policies must adapt.

Accepting the Reality of Secular Stagnation
Lawrence H. Summers (F&D) Mar 1, 2020
New approaches are needed to deal with sluggish growth, low interest rates, and an absence of inflation.

Making Sense of Private Debt
David F. Perkis (FRBSL Page One Econ) Mar 1, 2020
If you had to guess, which would you say is higher, government debt or household and business debt? We definitely hear about the mounting U.S. national debt and how much tax revenue it will take to pay it back. But private debt is even higher. As of the first quarter of 2019, public debt was equal to 100% of U.S. GDP while private debt was equal to 148% of GDP, with businesses and households each contributing half of that private debt burden

There is a landing zone for a UK-EU trade deal
FT View Mar 2, 2020
Britain's negotiating paper is not as hardline as the rhetoric suggests.

The world must look beyond sun and wind for hydrogen
Jonathan Ford (FT) Mar 2, 2020
We need lots of the gas, and cheaply, if it is to help replace liquid carbon fuels.

Fed should not try to fight the coronavirus
Karen Petrou (FT) Mar 2, 2020
Intervention would confirm moral hazard as defining market principle of post-crisis era.

Extraordinary complacency: the coronavirus and emerging markets
Geoff Dennis (FT) Mar 2, 2020
Outlook for EM equities 'bleak' amid risk of global recession.

Brexit solved with the sword of Damocles
Gideon Rachman (FT) Mar 2, 2020
The UK is being belligerent, the EU inflexible. But a deal can be done this year.

Calls for policymakers to act to prevent coronavirus 'doom loop'
Chris Giles, Robin Harding, Brendan Greeley, and Martin Arnold (FT) Mar 2, 2020
Predictions of shortlived shock from outbreak appear increasingly optimistic, economists warn.

How big a risk is a wave of sovereign defaults?
Clare Jones (FT) Mar 2, 2020
Governments can borrow cheaply. That could be a poor reflection of the longer term risks.

China Stopped Its Economy to Tackle Coronavirus. Now the World Suffers.
Alexandra Stevenson (NYT) Mar 2, 2020
The virtual shutdown of one of the world's biggest economies is hurting business around the globe, from multinational firms to truck drivers and tour guides.

Capital Is Part of the Coronavirus Cure
Adena Friedman (WSJ) Mar 2, 2020
And markets have historically been quick to recover from pandemic threats.

If coronavirus hurts the economy, Trump will go nuts
Paul Waldman (WP) Mar 2, 2020
Nothing poses a greater threat to his reelection.

China's ruling elite stumbles into a 'disaster'
Gordon Watts (AT) Mar 2, 2020
Deserted factories, businesses struggling to survive and the economy on life-support. For China, the start of 2020 has been an unmitigated disaster after the Covid-19 outbreak swept across the country before spreading to more than 50 other nations.

America's central bank acts to offset the impact of covid-19
Economist Mar 2, 2020
Expect other central banks to cut interest rates too.

Fifty years of growth and inequality
Brian Caplen (Banker) Mar 2, 2020
The Banker's Top 1000 ranking of global banks is 50 years old in July. Over that period the banking industry has grown exponentially, with large banks becoming ever more dominant, writes Brian Caplen.

The global macroeconomic impacts of COVID-19: 7 scenarios
Warwick McKibbin and Roshen Fernando (Brookings) Mar 2, 2020
Seven different scenarios of how the coronavirus might evolve in the coming year, examining potential macroeconomic and financial market outcomes.

Tackling the fallout from the coronavirus
Laurence Boone (OECD) Mar 2, 2020
The world economy is in its most precarious position since the global financial crisis.

Europeans take the Euro for granted
Joris Melman and Giuseppe Porcaro (Bruegel) Mar 2, 2020
We compared an analysis of the media with the preliminary findings of a qualitative research project. The results confirm national differences, but highlight also variations across social groups, and the way citizens make sense of politics in the first place.

A Global Economic Shock Needs a Global Solution
Mohamed A. El-Erian (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 2, 2020
National policy measures alone are unlikely to prove sufficient in combating the effects of the coronavirus.

Italy Shows How to Tackle the Coronavirus Impact
Ferdinando Giugliano (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 2, 2020
The country's fiscal measures make sense, but it would be far better if the euro zone had a coordinated action plan -- and fund.

Another Bad Week for Markets Will Force the Fed's Hand
Tim Duy (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 2, 2020
Like it or not, central bankers can't let Wall Street slide indefinitely. That likely means a rate cut sooner rather than later.

That 1970s Feeling
Kenneth Rogoff (Project Syndicate) Mar 2, 2020
Policymakers and too many economic commentators fail to grasp how the next global recession may be unlike the last two. In contrast to recessions driven mainly by a demand shortfall, the challenge posed by a supply-side-driven downturn is that it can result in sharp drops in production, generalized shortages, and rapidly rising prices.

Unleashing the Economic Power of Women
David Malpass (Project Syndicate) Mar 2, 2020
Governments increasingly recognize that economies can reach their full potential only with the full participation of both women and men. To help countries achieve this goal, the World Bank Group is focusing on four key areas in particular.

The fundamentals of safe assets
Maurizio Michael Habib, Livio Stracca, and Fabrizio Venditti (VoxEU) Mar 2, 2020
What makes government bonds a safe asset? This column shows that the low political and institutional risk of issuing countries and the relative size of the debt market foster a safe asset status, with the latter factor – size – reflecting the special role of the US in providing a large, deep and liquid market for government bonds. Inertia – whether the bond behaved as a safe asset in the past – is also important. Notably, the drivers of safe asset status are heterogeneous within advanced and emerging markets, with external sustainability in particular being relevant for the latter group of countries.

The Brexit vote and inflation – updated evidence
Holger Breinlich, Elsa Leromain, Dennis Novy, and Thomas Sampson (VoxEU) Mar 2, 2020
When the UK voted to leave the EU on 23 June 2016, financial markets were taken by surprise and the sterling exchange rate depreciated sharply. Since then, UK imports have become more expensive. The original version of this column, published in November 2017, found weaker sterling increased UK consumer prices by 1.7% in the year after the referendum. Updating the analysis using more recent data, we estimate that the Brexit depreciation increased UK consumer prices by 2.9%. This represents an £870 per year increase in the cost of living for the average UK household, meaning people have to work 1.4 weeks longer to afford the same goods and services.

Pompeo to Pressure U.N. Over Aid to Yemen
Colum Lynch and Robbie Gramer (FP) Mar 2, 2020
The Trump administration is upset that too much of it is falling into the hands of Houthi rebels.

Why Is Unemployment Currently So Low?
Marianna Kudlyak and Mitchell G. Ochse (FRBSF Econ Letter) Mar 2, 2020
Unemployment is at a 50-year low. The low rate is not from an unusually high job-finding rate out of unemployment but, rather, an unusually low rate at which people enter unemployment. The low entry rate reflects a long-run downward trend likely due to population aging, better job matches, and other structural factors. These developments lowered the long-run unemployment rate trend. At the end of 2019, the unemployment rate was below the trend but no more so than in previous business cycle peaks, indicating that the labor market is no tighter.

Coronavirus calls for more global co-operation
FT View Mar 3, 2020
A co-ordinated response is needed to protect health and prosperity.

EM bonds appear immune to coronavirus
Jonathan Wheatley (FT) Mar 3, 2020
The sector is holding up well but how long will it last if monetary stimulus efforts fall short.

Currency sell-off threatens emerging market response to coronavirus
Steve Johnson (FT) Mar 3, 2020
Rising inflation may force central banks to end loosening cycles even as growth weakens.

Global Health Crisis 1, Economic Policymakers 0
Peter S. Goodman (NYT) Mar 3, 2020
As leaders of the world's wealthiest countries pledged to limit the damage from the coronavirus, they appeared to be operating with limited options.

The Coronavirus 'Stimulus'
WSJ Mar 3, 2020
The markets aren't impressed by the Fed or a payroll-tax cut.

Will the Coronavirus Cause a Recession? Keep Your Eye on the Barbershops
Ben Casselman (NYT) Mar 3, 2020
The Fed reduced rates to keep the effects of the outbreak from spreading to sectors not directly affected by the virus.

Can the Fed and Friends Save the Economy?
Paul Krugman (NYT) Mar 3, 2020
On putting too much faith in central bankers.

Globalization and Pandemics: Global Problems Require Global Responses
Arthur E. Appleton (Globalist) Mar 3, 2020
The rapid dispersion of many diseases is one of the inevitable characteristics of globalization. Nationalist approaches are therefore completely counter-productive.

Fed Moves First to Counter COVID-19 Market Fears
Tiffany Wilding, Nicola Mai, and Lupin Rahman (PIMCO) Mar 3, 2020
The Federal Reserve wants to avoid a crisis of confidence.

The Fed Has Another Lever to Pull
Mike Cudzil and Daniel H. Hyman (PIMCO) Mar 3, 2020
The Fed could give the economy a powerful boost by maintaining the mix of assets on its balance sheet.

Designing an effective US policy response to coronavirus
David Wilcox (PIIE) Mar 3, 2020
The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) now seems highly likely to cause an economic slump, both in the United States and globally. Only a little more than 60 days after word of a mysterious and previously unknown illness first emerged from Wuhan, China, the Federal Reserve responded on March 3 by cutting its policy rate by an unusually large ½ percentage point. More unusual still, the Fed moved two weeks ahead of the next regularly scheduled meeting of its rate-setting committee. At this point, the real question is how severe and long the slump will be.

Trump's phase one deal relies on China's state-owned enterprises
Chad P. Bown and Mary E. Lovely (PIIE) Mar 3, 2020
President Donald Trump's trade war with China has been counterproductive from the start. His tariffs raised prices and punished American consumers. China retaliated against US agricultural exports as expected, hurting American farmers. But now even Trump's trade deal with China is undermining his administration's professed policy agenda. The phase one accord committing China to buy additional US goods seems certain to strengthen Chinese state-owned enterprises (SOEs) and state control of the economy—the very policies the administration's trade war supposedly sought to combat.

What Coronavirus Could Mean for the Global Economy
Philipp Carlsson-Szlezak, Martin Reeves, and Paul Swartz (HBR) Mar 3, 2020
Is a recession inevitable?

To save the Italian economy from the Coronavirus, Rome prescribes a stimulus
Simone Tagliapietra (Bruegel) Mar 3, 2020
Faced with a difficult prognosis, the Italian government has prescribed a three-step strategy to treat the worse economic symptoms of the Coronavirus. The medicine is money and the dosage is €4.5 billion

What can the EU learn from the China-Switzerland free trade agreement?
Marta Domínguez-Jiménez and Uri Dadush (Bruegel) Mar 3, 2020
The US-China trade war has placed EU trade relations with China under the microscope. Should the EU challenge China's trade practices and employ trade defence measures? Or should they be diplomatic and embark on negotiations, perhaps paving the way to a Free Trade Agreement? Close examination of the 2013 agreement between China and Switzerland suggests much will have to change for trade negotiations between China and the EU to succeed.s

Hong Kong's Helicopter Money Struggles for Lift
Andy Mukherjee (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 3, 2020
Giving people a coronavirus handout and taking it away with a new tax would be a bad idea.

The Fed Has Plenty of Ammunition Left for Coronavirus
Ramesh Ponnuru (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 3, 2020
A rate cut was called for, but the central bank can't now rest on its laurels.

China's Economic Data Hints at What the U.S. Can Expect from Coronavirus
Conor Sen (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 3, 2020
It helps to understand the trajectory of the virus.

Market Superheros Better Not Disappoint This Time
Daniel Moss (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 3, 2020
When G-7 finance ministers and central bankers meet, they'll have a chance to redo their haphazard response to the global financial crisis.

The Fiscal Fight Against COVID-19
Koichi Hamada (Project Syndicate) Mar 3, 2020
Governments should rely on fiscal rather than monetary measures when responding to natural disasters or epidemics such as the new COVID-19 coronavirus. Above all, policymakers must act quickly, and – particularly in the case of Japan – not be swayed by misleading statements regarding the level of public debt.

Globalizing the AI Revolution in Health Care
Dominik Ruettinger (Project Syndicate) Mar 3, 2020
Machine learning and big data promise to make the process of discovering and applying new cancer treatments faster and more effective than ever. But to realize these technologies' potential, we will need pragmatic, globally standardized policies governing the collection and use of medical data.

Are financial crises demand or supply shocks?
Felipe Benguria ands Alan M. Taylor (VoxEU) Mar 3, 2020
A perennial and fundamental macroeconomic question is whether financial crises are negative demand or supply shocks. This column discusses how the response of international trade flows and prices to financial crises can shed light on the debate. Evidence based on a new dataset of two centuries of financial crises and trade suggests financial crises are clearly negative shocks to demand.

COVID-19: Quality Shock to Globalization
Stephen Roach (YaleGlobal) Mar 3, 2020
Too many governments have made a devil's compact with globalization – prioritizing speed and quantity of economic growth over quality

Fed Cuts Rates 50 bps-Further Easing Likely in Store
Jay H. Bryson (WF) Mar 3, 2020
The FOMC cut rates 50 bps today due to the risks that the coronavirus outbreak poses to the U.S. economy. We look for the committee to ease further by the end of the second quarter.

Fed rate cut is no cure-all for coronavirus woes
FT View Mar 4, 2020
Other central banks will now have to decide whether to follow suit.

Coronavirus raises risk of trouble in corporate bonds
Mohamed El-Erian (FT) Mar 4, 2020
Even the Fed's rate cut cannot prevent economic 'sudden stops' that will hurt business.

Coronavirus poses test of capitalism's stakeholder conversion
Andrew Edgecliffe-Johnson (FT) Mar 4, 2020
Outbreak will show whether there is substance behind pledges to manage for the long term.

Coronavirus brings global shipping to brink of paralysis
Jonathan Wheatley (FT) Mar 4, 2020
Recent data suggest activity may be recovering but knock-on effects will take time to unwind.

Globalisation spreads contagion of many kinds
Ian Goldin (FT) Mar 4, 2020
Today's integrated and complex systems are only as strong as their weakest link.

Fed rate cut sends strong coronavirus signal
Martin Sandbu (FT) Mar 4, 2020
Jay Powell is letting the US economy know that when things get rocky, he has its back.

Bonds Aren't as Safe as You Think
Steven Grey (WSJ) Mar 4, 2020
If interest rates rise, they'll plummet in value, forcing investors to sell at a loss or stay trapped for years.

Fed ignites Asia's race to the bottom
William Pesek (AT) Mar 4, 2020
With the US already out of the gates, Asia's central banks need to huddle.

Can the American banking system keep cash flowing if the economy stops?
Economist Mar 4, 2020
Banks are on the front lines of the economic fallout from the spread of covid-19.

How Japan and Singapore Are Reinventing Old Age
Pang Sze-Yunn and Yvonne Arivalagan (Brink) Mar 4, 2020
A new demographic dividend – the "longevity dividend" – is emerging as populations age, and two Asian countries are responding quickly and early to the demographic shift. Both Singapore and Japan are implementing innovative policies and solutions designed to reap the benefits of the longevity dividend. What these two countries are doing to stay ahead of the shift and how other countries can learn from these two examples.

Downsides to Hong Kong's untargeted cash handout
Alicia García-Herrero (Bruegel/AT) Mar 4, 2020
The stimulus is regressive in nature, as the bulk of expenditure is a one-off cash disbursement per adult

"Political Anarchy" Is How the West Got Rich
Ryan McMaken (Mises Wire) Mar 4, 2020
Why did Europe go from a poor backwater to an economic and technological powerhouse? A major factor was its lack of any centralized government, and a large number of small competing states.

Market Response Doesn't Mean the Fed Is Useless
Tim Duy (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 4, 2020
Rate cuts alone won't change sentiment when so much about the coronavirus crisis is still unknown. But they can help cushion the blow.

The Coronavirus Is a Human Credit Crunch
Clara Ferreira Marques (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 9, 2020
A sudden stop in the flow of money triggered the global financial crisis. A halt in the movement of people is potentially even more damaging.

The Fed's Rate Cut Is Just the Excuse We Need
Daniel Moss (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 4, 2020
Interest rates were already grinding lower in Asia. The move from the U.S. will only accelerate that.

How to Fix the Federal Reserve
Barry Ritholtz (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 5, 2020
The central bank has gotten everyone hooked on ultra-low interest rates.

OPEC's Capacity for Shock and Awe Is Limited
Liam Denning (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 4, 2020
Another oil production cut would mainly be another signal of weakness.

The Coronavirus Is a Human Credit Crunch
Clara Ferreira Marques (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 4, 2020
A sudden stop in the flow of money triggered the global financial crisis. A halt in the movement of people is potentially even more damaging.

Will American Populism Damage Japan?
Yoichi Funabashi (Project Syndicate) Mar 4, 2020
Japan has a wealth of opportunities to help strengthen the liberal international order as a rule-shaper, but its ability to do so is still based on its alliance with the United States. And that could be in jeopardy if November's US presidential election ends up being a contest between President Donald Trump and Senator Bernie Sanders.

Public interventions in the banking sector
Giovanni Dell'Ariccia, Deniz Igan, Paolo Mauro, Hala Moussawi, Alexander F. Tieman, and Aleksandra Zdzienicka (VoxEU) Mar 4, 2020
During the Global Crisis, governments rescued banks with capital injections, asset purchases, and guarantees. Until now, we have had no clear idea what happened to that taxpayer money. This column uses bank-level data to compile a comprehensive accounting of the costs of, and returns on, these interventions. While initial public support cost $1.6 trillion, the total fiscal impact has been $250 billion – on average less than 1% of GDP.

Estimating China's Growth Potential from Its Global Value Chain Position
Dazhong Cheng, Jian Wang, and Zhiguo Xiao (VoxChina) Mar 4, 2020
We find that China's potential growth in GDP per capita is substantially underestimated if the level of GDP per capita is employed as the convergence indicator as done in previous studies (e.g., Barro, 2015 and 2016). Using data on China's position in the global value chain (GVC) prior to 2010, we predict that the country's GDP per capita could have grown at 7%–8% annually between 2010 and 2015, which is closer to the actually growth rates of 7.8%, than predicted by the previous estimation of around 4%, which was based on GDP per capita.

Blindsided on the Supply Side
Elisabeth Braw (FP) Mar 4, 2020
The coronavirus outbreak has shown that supply-chain disruptions could wreak far greater havoc on the global economy—and national security—than most CEOs and governments realize.

Don't give up on the Fed's virus-fighting powers
Robin Wigglesworth (FT) Mar 5, 2020
Emergency rates cut causes alarm in markets after initial spurt of excitement.

As the ETF turns 30 active managers should embrace it
Salim Ramji (FT) Mar 5, 2020
Exchange traded funds can provide greater flexibility, lower costs and ready access.

Wealthy Americans need not fear Nordic-style socialism
Martin Sandbu (FT) Mar 5, 2020
Sweden and its ilk have even more billionaires per capita than the US.

Coronavirus is a warning to strengthen health systems
David Malpass (FT) Mar 5, 2020
This outbreak can be contained given our shared goals — but we must act fast.

What bond markets tell us about Lagarde's next move
Tommy Stubbington (FT) Mar 5, 2020
The European Central Bank does not enjoy the same room for manoeuvre as the Fed.

Coronavirus and the $2bn race to find a vaccine
Hannah Kuchler, Clive Cookson and Sarah Neville (FT) Mar 5, 2020
The start-up leading the US fight to immunise people will need state backing and up to 18 months to make the venture work.

The right medicine for the world economy
Economist Mar 5, 2020
Coping with the pandemic involves all of government, not just the health system.

The IFC Should Get a Capital Increase, but More Reform Should Be Part of the Package
Charles Kenny (CGD) Mar 5, 2020
My colleagues Nancy Lee and Mark Plant have made a strong case that the International Finance Corporation (IFC) should get its capital increase from the US Congress. Private investment is vital to growth and poverty reduction, and Nancy and Mark report that the IFC is working to increase the transparency and development impact of its projects, crowd in private financing, and increase its focus on poor countries. I think the IFC should get its capital increase, too, in part for some of the reasons they suggest. But I'm not convinced that the IFC will manage to deliver on all of the promises it is making in order to receive the funds. And I think that congressional concerns with the IFC's use of aid in an attempt to meet lending targets are right. So, reform should come alongside resources.

The refugee crisis returns to Europe—or does it?
Jacob Funk Kirkegaard (PIIE) Mar 5, 2020
Violent clashes along the Turkish border, with Greek riot police using tear gas and rubber bullets to repel would-be migrants and refugees, have become a familiar specter in Europe. As in 2015, the immigration issue threatens to fracture European unity and torment its conscience. But the crisis of 2020 is not likely to repeat the one five years ago. This time, Greek and virtually all EU political leaders support a firm response to protect their external border and will likely be able to block the entry of most illegal entrants. The prospects for agreement on a new genuine common EU migration and asylum policy may be receding, however.

China has been overstating the role of private investment in its economy
Nicholas R. Lardy (PIIE) Mar 5, 2020
The recrudescence of state control of the economy in China has been widely noted in this space and elsewhere, along with evidence that this shift is suppressing China's economic expansion. But newly released data from China's statistical agency show that previously published official data for recent years substantially overstate the share of private investment and understate the role of the state.

China Gives Global Miners an African Headache
Clara Ferreira Marques (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 5, 2020
Beijing's blessing for the Simandou project in Guinea would threaten Rio and the other companies that dominate iron-ore production.

Bankers Are Staring Into the Abyss, Again
Marcus Ashworth and Elisa Martinuzzi (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 5, 2020
The ECB can do some things to help on the coronavirus outbreak, but it can't afford to unwind progress on bad loans and capital buffers.

Developing World Has Lessons for Handling Virus Shocks
Mohamed A. El-Erian (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 5, 2020
Policy actions need to address the underlying drivers of economic dislocations and insecurity.

Assessing Global Economic Risks as COVID-19 Spreads
Erik Nelson and Jennifer Licis (WF) Mar 5, 2020
This report uses a simple framework to assess supply and demand-side risks in a global pandemic scenario. Our analysis suggests that Switzerland and the Eurozone may be among the most economically exposed advanced nations to a global pandemic scenario, while Korea and Singapore look to be relatively more exposed than most other emerging economies.

How Much Will Global Economic Data Deteriorate? Using South Korea as a Leading Indicator
Michael Pugliese and Hop Mathews (WF) Mar 5, 2020
While monitoring Chinese economic data in the months ahead will be important for financial markets, it may not offer many clues for how a broader outbreak could impact the economic performance of a country like the United States. In our view, the South Korean economy could offer some useful clues as to how a more widespread outbreak could impact major developed market economies.

China's post-virus stimulus: no silver bullet
David Lubin (FT) Mar 6, 2020
The world should not expect another bailout by Beijing.

Spiraling Virus Fears Are Causing Financial Carnage
David Enrich, James B. Stewart and Matt Phillips (NYT) Mar 6, 2020
A global disease outbreak isn't the kind of risk that many investors were trained to react to.

Why a Coronavirus Recession Could Be Extra Painful: Its Suddenness
Neil Irwin (NYT) Mar 6, 2020
Although the immediate shock could be greater, recovery could also be quicker, given the economy's underlying strength.

A Chinese Mystery and Covid-19's Economic Puzzle
Holman W. Jenkins, Jr. (WSJ) Mar 6, 2020
Has Beijing 'contained' the virus? If so, was the cost worth the benefit, and would it be for the U.S.?

Coronavirus: The Economic Costs for North Korea
Troy Stangarone (Diplomat) Mar 6, 2020
The outbreak, and Pyongyang's response, will seriously strain the North Korean economy.

Russia's Defiance Sets the Stage for Oil Price 'Bloodbath'
Keith Johnson (FP) Mar 6, 2020
Moscow rejects OPEC's effort to avert a coronavirus-driven price collapse, shutting down an agreement to cut crude output.

Bank of Japan's policies have been a success
Adam S. Posen (PIIE/Nikkei Asian Review) Mar 6, 2020
Flat macroeconomic outcomes are acceptable.

Technology for All
Dani Rodrik (Project Syndicate) Mar 6, 2020
Technological change does not follow its own direction, but rather is shaped by moral frames, incentives, and power. If we think more about how innovation can be directed to serve society, we can afford to worry less about how we should adjust to it.

What COVID-19 Means for International Cooperation
Kemal Dervis and Sebastián Strauss (Project Syndicate) Mar 6, 2020
A clear parallel between the growing COVID-19 pandemic and climate change is emerging. In particular, both phenomena highlight the need for much closer forward-looking international cooperation to reduce and manage global threats.

The COVID-19 Blame Game Threatens Us All
Gregory A. Maniatis and Monette Zard (Project Syndicate) Mar 6, 2020
Despite the claims of nationalist politicians, refugees and forced migrants were not the source of COVID-19's spread. Blaming these vulnerable groups damns them twice – and exposes everyone to even greater risks.

The Rise and Fall of International Currencies
Paul De Grauwe (Project Syndicate) Mar 6, 2020
A new international monetary system that ends the global dominance of the US dollar is both necessary and desirable. But to anticipate what might come next, one first must understand the political and economic dynamics that give rise to international currencies in the first place.

Is quality upgrading a motive for vertical integration?
Christopher Hansman, Jonas Hjort, Gianmarco León-Ciliotta, and Matthieu Teachout (VoxDev) Mar 6, 2020
Vertically integrating suppliers is a strategy firms use to improve product quality by ensuring higher-quality inputs.

Artificial intelligence as a central banker
Jon Danielsson, Robert Macrae, and Andreas Uthemann (VoxEU) Mar 6, 2020
Artificial intelligence, such as the Bank of England Bot, is set to take over an increasing number of central bank functions. This column argues that the increased use of AI in central banking will bring significant cost and efficiency benefits, but also raise important concerns that are so far unresolved.

Bank funding shocks and credit reallocation
Olivier De Jonghe, Hans Dewachter, Klaas Mulier, Steven Ongena, and Glenn Schepens (VoxEU) Mar 6, 2020
Banks in Belgium made strategic lending decisions after the freeze of the interbank funding market in September 2008. This column uses bank-firm combinations to show that banks reallocated credit to sectors where they can more easily extract rents or in which they have an information advantage, or to low-risk firms.

How close is the US economy to recession?
Gavyn Davies (FT) Mar 7, 2020
The Federal Reserve will be watching the labour market before pushing the panic button.

Riskier bond issuers may find markets tough going
Joe Rennison (FT) Mar 7, 2020
Lower-rated companies have begun to worry about the task of refinancing vast debts.

China May Be Beating the Coronavirus, at a Painful Cost
Amy Qin (NYT) Mar 7, 2020
Beijing says its heavy-handed measures are working. Can other countries battling the outbreak learn from its efforts — or is the cure worse than the disease?

UK Budget should prioritise supporting the economy
FT View Mar 8, 2020
To counter turbulence, the chancellor has scope for a modest relaxation of fiscal rules.

The eurozone is too complacent about the coronavirus threat
Wolfgang Münchau (FT) Mar 8, 2020
Ideally governments would co-ordinate fiscal policy but there is no sense of urgency.

How to Read the Myopic Market
Andy Kessler (WSJ) Mar 8, 2020
Today's stock swings reflect the shortening of investors' timeline for predicting growth.

For the first time, Lebanon defaults on its debts
Economist Mar 8, 2020
Restructuring will be a struggle. Fixing the country's rentier economy will be even harder.

For the ECB, just cutting rates is not enough to tackle coronavirus
Huw van Steenis (FT) Mar 9, 2020
Central bank must come up with timely and targeted package of measures.

US economy is dangerously dependent on Wall Street
Rana Foroohar (FT) Mar 9, 2020
The Federal Reserve faces pressure to keep cutting rates to keep asset prices high.

Act now to prevent coronavirus shock from spreading
Ray Dalio (FT) Mar 9, 2020
Governments must step in with co-ordinated fiscal and monetary stimulus.

What banks are worth in a world of non-stop rate cuts
Robert Armstrong (FT) Mar 9, 2020
Big lenders will continue to be viable businesses but the same may not be true of many smaller peers.

Oil crash: why Saudi Arabia has started a global crude price war
Anjli Raval and David Sheppard (FT) Mar 9, 2020
Aggressive move by world's top exporter has sent shockwaves through markets.

Why the Outlook for the Economy Just Got Worse
Neil Irwin (NYT) Mar 9, 2020
Coronavirus worries already signaled a slowdown in consumer and service sectors. Then came abrupt moves in oil prices and bond yields.

The oil market just entered uncharted waters
Bill Farren-Price (FT) Mar 9, 2020
It will be hard if not impossible for Opec to walk back, having started down this path.

Now Comes the Oil Shock
WSJ Mar 9, 2020
Putin shows again he's not Trump's friend. What about MBS?

The Fed's Market Emollients
WSJ Mar 9, 2020
The central bank has liquidity tools to ease financial conditions.

How the Federal Reserve Can Ease the Coronavirus Panic
John Greenwood and Steve H. Hanke (WSJ) Mar 9, 2020
Rate cuts won't do much good, but the bank can calm panicky markets and avoid recession by supplying liquidity.

Japan Stands for Free Trade
Yasutoshi Nishimura (WSJ) Mar 9, 2020
Protectionism leads to poverty. Technology and trade promote growth.

The coronavirus is another test for Europe. Working together will be key.
Carl Bildt (WP) Mar 9, 2020
The challenge is medical and financial — but also political.

Oilmaggeddon is still bad news for Asia
Umesh Desai (AT) Mar 9, 2020
Weak growth data and global economy outlook point towards a recession.

How market panic can feed back to the world economy
Economist Mar 9, 2020
In short: via tighter credit for companies already at risk.

The Fed Panicked, and Its Rate Cut Is Making the Economy Worse
Daniel Lacalle (Mises Wire) Mar 9, 2020
The Federal Reserve's monumental mistake of cutting rates this past week can only be understood in the context of the rising God complex of central planners: an overwhelming combination of ignorance and arrogance.

Limiting the Economic Fallout of the Coronavirus with Large Targeted Policies
Gita Gopinath (IMF) Mar 9, 2020
This health crisis will have a significant economic fallout, reflecting shocks to supply and demand different from past crises. Substantial targeted policies are needed to support the economy through the epidemic, keeping intact the web of economic and financial relationships between workers and businesses, lenders and borrowers, and suppliers and end-users for activity to recover once the outbreak fades. The goal is to prevent a temporary crisis from permanently harming people and firms through job losses and bankruptcies.

The cost of coronavirus in terms of interrupted global value chains
Gerard Masllorens and Maria Demertzis (Bruegel) Mar 9, 2020
The coronavirus is slowly morphing itself into an important shock. While the extent and cost of this pandemic are unknown, we do know that global supply chains that link Europe to China will be seriously disturbed. We take a look at the numbers based on input-output models. The industry that will be the most affected is Computers and Electronics, followed by textiles.

How to Turn a Banking Rescue Into a Crisis
Andy Mukherjee (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 9, 2020
India is botching the takeover of Yes, sending ripples through the financial system.

Central Banks Need to Sober Up for This Panic
Andy Mukherjee (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 9, 2020
Cutting rates to fight the coronavirus is just putting more pressure on lenders like HSBC, Citi and StanChart.

How Europe Should Manage the Coronavirus-Induced Crisis
Daniel Gros (Project Syndicate) Mar 9, 2020
Neither interest-rate cuts nor new government spending would do much to offset the short-term effects of COVID-19 in Europe. Central banks and government authorities should explain this to the public, and then focus their attention on the less glamorous work of safeguarding public health, household incomes, and the financial system.

Epidemics and Economic Policy
Kaushik Basu (Project Syndicate) Mar 9, 2020
A far-reaching global crisis demands a comprehensive global response. A multilateral organization such as the World Bank or the International Monetary Fund should urgently establish a task force comprising, say, 20 economists with diverse specialties, as well as experts in health and geopolitics.

The US Federal Reserve's Debt Purchases Are a Warning
David Ahn and Robert H. Dugger (Project Syndicate) Mar 9, 2020
As was true during World War II, the US Federal Reserve needs to buy Treasury debt on a sustained basis to prevent crippling interest-rate spikes. This "new normal" is a clear warning that the US must address new generation-spanning challenges such as excessive government debt with a wartime sense of urgency.

Measuring the impact of malfunctioning credit markets on productivity
Tim Besley, Isabelle Roland, and John Van Reenen (VoxEU) Mar 9, 2020
Since the Global Crisis, there has been a renewed awareness of how frictions in credit markets can damage economic efficiency due to a higher cost of capital and/or capital being misallocated away from its most productive uses. This column presents a new methodological approach for calculating the cost of credit frictions which can be implemented with relatively simple data in multiple contexts. It finds that credit market frictions explain half of the fall in UK productivity in the Great Recession and depress output by 28% on average.

Wall Street Plunges as Trump Fiddles in Response to the Coronavirus
John Cassidy (New Yorker) Mar 9, 2020
Even if the stock market stabilizes, we will still need to mitigate the virus's impact on the domestic and international economies—but that would require forceful U.S. leadership, which no longer exists.

An Economic Pandemic
Keith Johnson (FP) Mar 9, 2020
With markets plunging worldwide, Trump does an about-face and promises "major" efforts to contain the coronavirus and ease economic pain.

Why This Oil Crash Is Different
Jason Bordoff (FP) Mar 9, 2020
The oil price collapse has sent shockwaves through financial markets. But the geopolitical earthquake could reach even farther.

Oil Plunge: Lower Inflation, but Also Inflation Expectations?
Sarah House (WF) Mar 9, 2020
The plunge in oil prices over the weekend stands to slash Q2 PCE inflation to 1.0%, but should not have a direct bearing on core PCE. That said, the potential hit to inflation expectations could prove problematic for the Fed.

Downturn needs a global fiscal and health response
FT View Mar 10, 2020
The priority is to safeguard companies and jobs until a recovery kicks in.

Riyadh puts the squeeze on US shale producers
FT View Mar 10, 2020
America will be hardest hit in oil price war with Russia.

How this market crash is different from 2008, and the same
Mohamed El-Erian (FT) Mar 10, 2020
The global economy's banking nerve centre is not under threat.

Coronavirus risks the return of currency wars
Robin Harding (FT) Mar 10, 2020
US monetary easing should be done with Japan and the eurozone and not to them.

Why investors should brace for aftershocks
Robin Wigglesworth (FT) Mar 10, 2020
Good reasons to be wary remain despite bounce in equity markets following day of mayhem.

Russia is digging in for a long battle in the oil price war
David Sheppard (FT) Mar 10, 2020
Rosneft chief Igor Sechin seems keen to drive US shale companies out of business.

Why there are no winners from the oil price plunge this time
Delphine Strauss (FT) Mar 11, 2020
Coronavirus hit to demand will prevent any boost to growth, economists say.

Coronavirus: China's risky plan to revive the economy
Tom Mitchell, Christian Shepherd and Sherry Fei Ju (FT) Mar 10, 2020
Beijing is targeting a second-quarter rebound but the crisis has exposed the limitations of the system under Xi Jinping.

The oil price war's ultimate loser is America
WP Mar 10, 2020
Putin and the Saudi crown prince are destabilizing the U.S. economy for their own selfish ends.

Carbon pricing represents the best answer to our climate danger
Sheldon Whitehouse and James Slevin (WP) Mar 10, 2020
The generated revenue should be used in a way that helps workers, families and communities.

Covid-19 Makes Oil Markets Sweat
Daniel Yergin (WSJ) Mar 10, 2020
Russia's push for lower prices gets a boost from a demand shock. Can U.S. shale producers survive?

Kremlin confident it can win oil price war
Giovanni Pigni (AT) Mar 10, 2020
Russia and Rosneft reckon they can weather the storm, but not everybody agrees.

Uncoordinated policies behind market collapse
Alicia García-Herrero (Bruegel) Mar 10, 2020
After more than a month of horrible news on the Covid-19 coronavirus outbreak, first in China and then globally, the markets have finally abdicated.

Three macroeconomic issues and Covid-19
Leonardo Cadamuro and Francesco Papadia (Bruegel) Mar 10, 2020
Supply and demand and the COVID-19 shock.

Economic Outlook Update: ILU Trajectories
Joachim Fels (PIMCO) Mar 10, 2020
Global growth could follow a U-shaped path over the next few quarters, though substantial uncertainty remains as policymakers grapple with the impact of the coronavirus.

The West and Japan's Response to Cheap Money
Tomas Casas i Klett (Globalist) Mar 10, 2020
In every culture, low interest rates impact the fabric of society and mindsets in distinct ways. Each country thus develops its unique manifestation of nihilism.

The G20 Should Tell the MDBs to Boost Crisis Lending by $100 to $200 billion
Scott Morris and Amanda Glassman (CGD) Mar 10, 2020
Are the MDBs up to the task, and at what level of financing?

Commitment to Development 2020: Reassessing What Matters Most
Lee Robinson and Ian Mitchell (CGD) Mar 10, 2020
Fifteen years and three expert reviews.

Tax Revenues in Africa Will be Insufficient to Finance Development Goals
Sanjeev Gupta and Jianhong Liu (CGD) Mar 10, 2020
A quick look at the region's record in raising tax revenues.

Airlines Are Sounding Alarms. Shouldn't Suppliers, Too?
Brooke Sutherland (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 10, 2020
The coronavirus effect that's rippling through the travel industry is still making its way through the supply chain.

Egypt's Economy Faces a Double Whammy
Timothy Kaldas (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 10, 2020
Already threatened by the coronavirus crisis, Egypt braces for the fallout of the Saudi-Russian oil war.

The U.S. Economy Is Now in Uncharted Waters
Tyler Cowen (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 10, 2020
Why it's so hard to design an economic response to the coronavirus.

The Fed Can't Let Bond Yields Fall to Zero
Danielle DiMartino-Booth (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 10, 2020
Ultra-low rates on benchmark government debt would have negative consequences for the global financial system.

Best Coronavirus Response? QE Plus Infrastructure Spending
Noah Smith (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 10, 2020
One would help now, the other in the long run.

COVID-19 Is an Opportunity for Europe
Lucrezia Reichlin (Project Syndicate) Mar 10, 2020
The European Union has always advanced on the back of crises. In this sense, the COVID-19 outbreak could represent a chance for the EU to create a powerful crisis-management mechanism, which pools members' resources and channels them toward a coordinated fiscal policy.

The Wealth and Health of Nations
Willem H. Buiter (Project Syndicate) Mar 10, 2020
The COVID-19 outbreak's implications for the global economy are highly uncertain but potentially disastrous. To understand the risks, one should remember Adam Smith's insight about the true engine of wealth creation, the division of labor, which itself is dependent on the size and extent of markets.

COVID-19 by the Numbers
Anatole Kaletsky (Project Syndicate) Mar 10, 2020
Callous as it may sound, the economic and political impact of the coronavirus pandemic will ultimately be determined by the epidemiological and clinical data. Fortunately, in this case, the relevant statistical trends are developing in a much less alarming way than panicked media headlines might suggest.

Coronanomics 101
Barry Eichengreen (Project Syndicate) Mar 10, 2020
In the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic, economists, economic policymakers, and bodies like the G7 should humbly acknowledge that "all appropriate tools" imply, above all, those wielded by medical practitioners and epidemiologists. Coordination, autonomy, and transparency must be the watchwords.

Coronavirus and macroeconomic policy
Luca Fornaro and Martin Wolf (VoxEU) Mar 10, 2020
The consensus is that the coronavirus outbreak will cause a negative supply shock to the world economy, by forcing factories to shut down and disrupting global supply chains. This column develops a simple model to show that the spread of the virus might cause a demand-driven slump, give rise to a supply-demand doom loop, and open the door to stagnation traps induced by pessimistic animal spirits.

Oil price wars in a time of COVID-19
Rabah Arezki and Rachel Yuting Fan (VoxEU) Mar 10, 2020
A combination of supply and demand shocks has sent oil prices plunging and financial markets tumbling. This column argues that if the decline in oil prices persists, it will erode the fragile macroeconomic and social stability of countries, especially in the Middle East and North Africa, that have been hit by the novel coronavirus.

US Tightens Scrutiny on Foreign Investment
Xiaoli Jin (YaleGlobal) Mar 10, 2020
The Trump administration and US Congress seek tighter scrutiny of foreign direct investment in US firms, with new rules in effect

Let's Talk About Coronavirus Bailouts, Before We Need Them
Andrew Ross Sorkin (NYT) Mar 11, 2020
In 2008, policymakers rescued the economy but raised a divisive debate about the fairness of using tax dollars to save companies. Get ready for a repeat.

Monetary and Financial Stability During the Coronavirus Outbreak
Tobias Adrian (IMF) Mar 11, 2020
Global cooperation to synchronize monetary policy must be high on the agenda.

Services trade growth weakens as COVID-19 crisis hits global economy
WTO Mar 11, 2020
World services trade growth continued to weaken toward the end of 2019 and into the first quarter of 2020 according to the WTO's Services Trade Barometer, released on 11 March 2020. The latest reading of 96.8 is down from the 98.4 recorded last September and well below the baseline value of 100 for the index, suggesting below-trend growth in world services trade. The indicator does not yet fully capture the economic impact of the COVID-19 virus and is likely to decline further in the coming months.

Fiscal and Monetary Together
Peder Beck-Friis and Ketish Pothalingam (PIMCO) Mar 11, 2020
The Bank of England and the British government both announced easing measures to counter the effects of the coronavirus on the economy – how effective can we expect these measures to be? Read more

Oil Prices: Lower for Longer
Greg E. Sharenow (PIMCO) Mar 11, 2020
As the oil surplus builds, we expect U.S. crude oil to linger at $30-$40 per barrel for the next several months.

When Rate Cuts and Quantitative Easing Fall Flat
Tiffany Wilding (PIMCO) Mar 11, 2020
Fed rate cuts may be less effective at boosting the economy or markets as societies grapple with the spread of COVID-19, but other policy measures may help.

What if the rest of Europe follows Italy's coronavirus fate?
Simone Tagliapietra (Bruegel) Mar 11, 2020
The silence from Brussels could be as damaging as the silence on Italian streets

Is the ECB Facing Its Coronavirus Moment?
Mohamed A. El-Erian (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 11, 2020
Lagarde has an opportunity to set her own path for Europe's central bank and break with past inertia.

Bank of England and U.K. Show How to Deal With Virus
Mohamed A. El-Erian (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 11, 2020
A rate cut combined with fiscal action demonstrates the right policy response.

Coronavirus Stock Sell-Off Isn't a Repeat of 2008
Nir Kaissar (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 11, 2020
Equities are less expensive than they were before the financial crisis.

The Fed Proves It Will Do Whatever It Takes in Repo
Brian Chappatta (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 11, 2020
The central bank didn't waste time in reacting to signs of a cash crunch this time.

Clean Energy Is Also Resilient Energy
Jules Kortenhorst and Whitney Heastie (Project Syndicate) Mar 11, 2020
After years of increasingly severe hurricane seasons in which island countries and territories in the Caribbean have lost power for weeks and even months at a time, the need for climate resilience could not be clearer. And as the Bahamas is showing, the cleanest energy sources can also be the most resilient.

Improving State Effectiveness by Discouraging Civil Servants from Flattering Their Leaders
Alain de Janvry, Guojun He, Elisabeth Sadoulet, Shaoda Wang, and Qiong Zhang (VoxChina) Mar 11, 2020
Evaluation of public employees performance is essential to induce higher work efforts. We use an experiment in two provinces of china to explore how to design such evaluation. Results show that the incentive effect of evaluation can be larger if the employee does not know ex-ante who the evaluator will be, thus reducing attempts at personally influencing the evaluator and enhancing instead job achievements.

The UK productivity puzzle: CFM survey
Ethan Ilzetzki (VoxEU) Mar 11, 2020
The UK has seen slow rates of productivity growth over the past decade, with output per hour and real wages no higher today than they were prior to the global financial crisis. This column reveals how nearly half of leading economists surveyed by the Centre for Macroeconomics point to low demand due to the financial crisis, austerity policies and Brexit as a major cause for this productivity slowdown. Despite this diagnosis, only a small minority of the panel believes that the solution lies in demand-side policy. Instead, a majority support promoting productivity growth through investments in education and worker training. Other policies, such as infrastructure investments, and tax and regulatory policies are also proposed.

COVID-19: Europe needs a catastrophe relief plan
Agnès Bénassy-Quéré, Ramon Marimon, Jean Pisani-Ferry, Lucrezia Reichlin, Dirk Schoenmaker, and Beatrice Weder di Mauro (VoxEU) Mar 11, 2020
The unfolding coronavirus epidemic represents a severe economic stress test for Europe as well as a test of European unity. This column discusses how the crisis might unfold and the appropriate policy response. It advocates a comprehensive emergency package through which the EU would take responsibility for a meaningful share of the overall emergency effort.

Trump and Johnson Can Quickly Strike a Trade Deal—If They Avoid the Pitfalls
Clark Packard (FP) Mar 11, 2020
The U.S. and Britain both want a trade agreement post-Brexit. China and chickens could get in the way.

Stock Shock: What Lies Ahead for Global Markets?
Jeremy Siegel & Mark Zandi (K@W) Mar 11, 2020
As the double whammy of the coronavirus crisis and an oil price war roils global markets, what should investors do?

COVID-19: Which Industries Are Exposed to a Hiring Hit?
Sarah House (WF) Mar 11, 2020
The striking pace of hiring to start the year will be hard to maintain amid efforts to contain COVID-19. Services are at greater risk than recent periods of slowing growth and threaten the broader health of the labor market.

U.K.: A Hitchhiker's Guide to Policy Coordination
Erik Nelson (WF) Mar 11, 2020
U.K. monetary and fiscal authorities announced a raft of support measures for its economy today as it grapples with the early stages of its own coronavirus outbreak. While some of the tools being used are perhaps blunt in nature, many of the measures are more targeted at supporting sectors of the economy that are likely to be hit hardest by the virus outbreak.

Fiscal Policy to the Rescue?
Michael Pugliese and Hop Mathews (WF) Mar 11, 2020
There is a common perception that U.S. fiscal capacity is as limited as the capacity for conventional monetary policy, but is this accurate? While there is possibly some truth to it, we believe the United States currently has the fiscal capacity to implement a large-scale fiscal stimulus, should it choose to do so.

COVID-19 Consumer Impact
Tim Quinlan and Shannon Seery (WF) Mar 11, 2020
COVID-19 and initial plans for its containment present some clear downside risks to the consumer spending outlook, but it would be premature to expect consumer spending to crater. Many categories of spending are resilient, even in the most uncertain times.

Coronavirus is not a crisis of globalisation
Robert Armstrong (FT) Mar 11, 2020
The distinction matters as leaders will otherwise draw the wrong lessons.

Iron ore market is putting a lot of faith in stimulus from China
Neil Hume (FT) Mar 12, 2020
Price of key steelmaking ingredient has held up, despite big drop in economic activity.

China's debt problem is really an asset problem
Jonathan Wheatley (FT) Mar 12, 2020
Property-fuelled borrowing binge has accounted for most of recent EM debt growth.

US stocks' record bull run brought to abrupt end
Robin Wigglesworth (FT) Mar 12, 2020
Dow Jones Industrial Average closes off 20% from peak and S&P 500 likely to follow.

Investors pull $41.7bn from emerging markets since start of outbreak
Jonathan Wheatley (FT) Mar 12, 2020
Most of the outflows have been from equities rather than bonds.

Fed firefighters must act quickly to limit financial contagion
Michael Mackenzie (FT) Mar 12, 2020
Central bank expands purchases of Treasuries in effort to calm fragile markets.

Something Weird Is Happening on Wall Street, and Not Just the Stock Sell-Off
Neil Irwin (NYT) Mar 12, 2020
A sinking feeling reminiscent of the global financial crisis, when all kinds of obscure markets went haywire.

Halting China's Economy Was Hard. Restarting It Is Harder.
Keith Bradsher (NYT) Mar 12, 2020
Beijing brought the world's No. 2 economy to a halt to quell the coronavirus epidemic. Its difficulties in reviving business offer a potential lesson for other countries.

Just How Bad Could a Coronavirus Recession Get?
Ian Goldin (NYT) Mar 12, 2020
There are ways to avert a major global economic meltdown. But they won't be easy in the age of Trump.

The Fed's Liquidity Cavalry
WSJ Mar 12, 2020
The central bank rides to the rescue of the Treasury market but in confusing fashion.

Europe's Viral Recession
WSJ Mar 12, 2020
Covid-19 would be less threatening if economies had been healthier

For the U.S., the biggest financial threat from China might not be the coronavirus
Josh Rogin (WP) Mar 12, 2020
Americans' pensions are being gambled on risky Chinese companies.

No one is likely to win the oil-price war
Economist Mar 12, 2020
Saudi Arabia, Russia and America will all suffer.

Corporate bonds and loans are at the centre of a new financial scare
Economist Mar 12, 2020
The pool of corporate lending has risen to $74trn.

Throughout history, pandemics have had profound economic effects
Economist Mar 12, 2020
Long-run economic effects are not always dreadful.

Global economy faces a 'US$2 trillion hit'
Gordon Watts (AT) Mar 12, 2020
'Doomsday' scenario' from the UN paints a chilling picture as WHO declares a pandemic.

The Economic Impact of COVID-19 in Low- and Middle-Income Countries
David Evans and Mead Over (CGD) Mar 12, 2020
Assessing the economic impact of COVID-19.

The Coronavirus Won't Be the Cause of the Next Bust, but It Will Make It Worse
Frank Shostak (Mises Wire) Mar 12, 2020
Although shocks can disrupt the pace of economic activity, they have nothing to do with the phenomenon of recurrent boom-bust cycles. This requires a mechanism that persistently and systematically feeds and supports it. The only mechanism that does this is central bank monetary policy.

Fracking Needs a Shakeout, Not a Bailout
Liam Denning (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 12, 2020
Propping up shale wells despite vanishing demand would expose the fallacy of Trump's "energy dominance" goal.

In These Aging Places, Coronavirus Is a Huge Threat
Justin Fox (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 12, 2020
Nations, states and counties where a large share of the population is older than 65 face big challenges as the disease spreads.

With Oil This Cheap, Why Bother Going Green?
Andreas Kluth (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 12, 2020
Plunging crude prices are bad news for the EU's Green Deal. But the bloc could grab the chance to extend its emissions trading system to the oil industry.

Markets Need to See the Government Panic
Jim Bianco (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 12, 2020
Investors are signaling they want politicians to do whatever it takes to stem the coronavirus, even if it damages the economy.

Christine Lagarde Does Whatever It Doesn't Take
Ferdinando Giugliano (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 12, 2020
The ECB president has raised fears that the central bank can no longer act as a stabilizing force for the euro zone.

As Bad as 2008? The Market's Fear Index Is Starting to Think So
Barry Ritholtz (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 12, 2020
The spike in the VIX is a reason to be worried. The question is just how much.

Christine Lagarde Has Three Big Options
Ferdinando Giugliano (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 12, 2020
The ECB president can launch a new round of cheap bank loans to help SMEs, cut interest rates and beef up QE. She needs to lead from the front.

The Federal Reserve Needs to Cut Rates to Zero Now
Tim Duy (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 12, 2020
The central bank needs to face reality with the economy probably in a recession already.

A Made-in-China Pandemic
Brahma Chellaney (Project Syndicate) Mar 12, 2020
The COVID-19 pandemic should be a wake-up call for a world that has accepted China's lengthening shadow over global supply chains for far too long. Only by reducing China's global economic influence – beginning in the pharmaceutical sector – can the world be kept safe from the country's political pathologies.

Piketty's Latest Charge
Willem H. Buiter (Project Syndicate) Mar 12, 2020
By offering a comprehensive history of "inequality regimes" around the world, French economist Thomas Piketty offers a deeply informative and rewarding overview of one of today's most pressing economic issues. But his own historical narrative suggests that his vision of global participatory socialism is a non-starter.

What the stock market tells us about the consequences of COVID-19
Stefano Ramelli and Alexander Wagner (VoxEU) Mar 12, 2020
The novel coronavirus represents a fearsome risk which is stirring feverish behaviour by investors worldwide. This column shows that initially, economic expectations about international trade underlay movements in the stock prices of individual firms; later, concerns about corporate debt began to play a role.

The Coronavirus Is Killing Globalization as We Know It
Philippe Legrain (FP) Mar 12, 2020
The outbreak has been a gift to nativist nationalists and protectionists, and it is likely to have a long-term impact on the free movement of people and goods.

Markets contemplate a future in which stimulus does not work
Gillian Tett (FT) Mar 13, 2020
Wall Street's plunge underlines Fed's diminishing ability to limit shockwaves.

An avalanche of destabilised debt and liquidity is coming our way
John Dizard (FT) Mar 13, 2020
Donald Trump sidelines banking reforms in coronavirus response.

Italy's struggle with coronavirus threatens the eurozone
Tony Barber (FT) Mar 13, 2020
Emergency measures are essential but carry risks for the multitude of small, family-run businesses.

Coronavirus trade disruption could start a 'dash for cash'
Gillian Tett (FT) Mar 13, 2020
Federal Reserve urged to consider bringing back 2008-era dollar swap lines.

Time to Write Deutsche Bank's Obituary?
Frank Vogl (Globalist) Mar 13, 2020
Deutsche Bank, once the powerhouse of the German economy, is being battered ever harder by the fallout from ferocious crises, with no safe harbor in sight.

Trump's trade policy is hampering the US fight against COVID-19
Chad P. Bown (PIIE) Mar 13, 2020
An alarming unintended consequence of President Donald Trump's misguided trade war with China has suddenly threatened to cripple the US fight against the COVID-19 pandemic. The administration's tariffs on Chinese medical products may contribute to shortages and higher costs of vital equipment at a time of nationwide health crisis. In the last two years, Trump's policy has forced China to divert the sales of these products—including protective gear for doctors and nurses and high-tech equipment to monitor patients—from the United States to other markets, and now the US medical establishment faces looming trouble importing these necessities from other countries, which may be hoarding them to meet their own health crises.

Housing, wealth accumulation and wealth distribution: risks and opportunities
Orsetta Causa and Nicolas Woloszko (OECD Ecoscope) Mar 13, 2020
Is housing a vehicle for wealth accumulation for middle class and lower-income groups? Can housing mitigate wealth inequality? Assessing housing from a wealth distribution perspective is all the more important in a context where inequality has been rising, where the capital share of income has increased relative to labour and where wealth inequality is much higher than income inequality, potentially undermining equality of opportunity and social mobility.

Fed Takes Action to Bolster Treasury Market Functioning
Tiffany Wilding and Rick Chan (PIMCO) Mar 13, 2020
The Fed announced two actions Thursday in response to stress in the market for U.S. Treasuries.

ECB Review: Fiscal First and Foremost
Andrew Bosomworth and Konstantin Veit (PIMCO) Mar 13, 2020
The European Central Bank (ECB) didn't follow other major central banks and refrained from cutting interest rates in response to the coronavirus outbreak. This signals a shift in the central bank's preferred policy tools.

What the Fed Can Do After It's Done All It Can
Ramesh Ponnuru (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 13, 2020
Early lesson of coronavirus: Drop the inflation target and focus on increasing total dollar spending.

Bond Market Mayhem Lives On in These 10 Charts
Brian Chappatta (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 13, 2020
Traders thought last week was bad. It turns out they hadn't seen anything yet.

China Knows a Thing or Two About Trader Tantrums
Shuli Ren (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 13, 2020
A big rush of stimulus won't calm markets. You need to dole out smaller bits more frequently, as Beijing has been doing.

At Least the Bankers Did Well With Christine Lagarde
Elisa Martinuzzi (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 13, 2020
The ECB offered a bold package of relief to banks. Unfortunately, easing capital rules is a risky move that won't exactly restore investor trust.

Trump's Global Recession
Anders Åslund (Project Syndicate) Mar 13, 2020
As long as US President Donald Trump remains in office, it is difficult to envisage any credible international effort to resolve the financial crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. As a result, there is now every reason to expect a long and severe global recession.

The Pandemic Stress Test
Raghuram G. Rajan (Project Syndicate) Mar 13, 2020
The COVID-19 crisis has exposed the underlying weaknesses in national economies, health systems, and even political ideologies. If there is any silver lining, it is that long-vilified experts and professionals have an opportunity to regain the public's trust.

When COVID-19 Comes to Africa
Arkebe Oqubay (Project Syndicate) Mar 13, 2020
There is no telling how long it will take to bring the COVID-19 coronavirus under control, or how many people will be affected. But African governments, in cooperation with communities and international actors, can take steps now to limit the damage – and lay the foundations for a healthier, more resilient future.

Economic shocks and the age of marriage in sub-Saharan Africa and India
Lucia Corno and Alessandra Voena (VoxDev) Mar 13, 2020
The age of marriage responds to economic conditions. Reducing child marriage requires understanding the economic role of culture and institutions.

Unpleasant convergence: Country spreads in advanced and emerging economies
Benjamin Born, Gernot Müller, Johannes Pfeifer, and Susanne Wellmann (VoxEU) Mar 13, 2020
Country spreads have traditionally been discussed in the context of emerging market economies, which tend to have high and volatile spreads. This column analyses spreads for both emerging and advanced economies before and after the Global Crisis. It argues that an 'unpleasant convergence' took place after 2008 and that the behaviour of country spreads in advanced economies is now similar to that in emerging economies. This is due to a both a decline in the volatility of the spreads for most emerging economies and an increase in volatility for advanced economies.

Keeping the lights on: Economic medicine for a medical shock
Richard Baldwin (VoxEU) Mar 13, 2020
The COVID-19 economic crisis is different. It hit the economic giants all at once – the G7 nations and China. And the economic strikes are widely spread, hitting many sectors all at once. It is not a credit crisis, or a banking crisis, or a sudden-stop crisis, or an exchange crisis. Today's crisis is a bit of all these. Given the transient nature of the underlying medical shock, this column argues that governments should focus on 'keeping the lights on' using costly but quick measures to ensure the circular flow of money continues to circulate. The goal should be to reduce the persistence of the crisis and avoid the unnecessary accumulation of 'economic scar tissue'.

How Trump Is Tanking His Own Presidency
Michael Hirsh (FP) Mar 13, 2020
His bumbling coronavirus response could well sink the economy—and his re-election chances.

Coronavirus: Scenarios for Europe
Holger Schmieding, Kallum Pickering and Florian Hense (Globalist) Mar 14, 2020
What is the economic fallout going to be for sure? And what will it be if it's a bad case?

A perfect storm wreaks havoc on global markets
FT View Mar 14, 2020
Political turmoil and Covid-19 both contributed to the end of a bull run.

This market was in trouble long before the virus hit
Michael Mackenzie (FT) Mar 14, 2020
Harsher medicine this time round would put asset prices on a better long-term footing.

With tariffs gone, the work begins for African trade
George Elombi (FT) Mar 14, 2020
Removal of tariff barriers by the AfCFTA is a starting point, not a destination.

Coronavirus could damage the euro zone
Henry Olsen (WP) Mar 14, 2020
The coronavirus pandemic may claim an unexpected victim: a united euro zone.

Big Virus Shock Can Be Contained and Reversed
Mohamed A. El-Erian (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 14, 2020
But fear and uncertainty threaten to cause paralysis and overreaction.

COVID-19: Governments must avoid creating additional uncertainty
Henrik Müller (VoxEU) Mar 14, 2020
The coronavirus crisis is hitting economies hard. This column argues that policymakers risk doing too little too late – and creating plenty of confusion on the way. It also suggests some lessons that can be learnt from the response to the last crisis.

Now is the time for a global fiscal response
FT View Mar 15, 2020
Pandemic requires co-ordinated stimulus just as much as the financial crisis.

How coronavirus became a corporate credit run
Rana Foroohar (FT) Mar 15, 2020
Central bankers are going to have to keep the money taps on.

Oil price crash only a foretaste of more to come
Pierre Noel (FT) Mar 15, 2020
The end of hydrocarbons as a lucrative business is a real possibility.

Eurozone stability is under threat again
Wolfgang Münchau (FT) Mar 15, 2020
Without a co-ordinated response, national stimulus policies will end up increasing imbalances.

Why the Fed dislikes negative rates
Gavyn Davies (FT) Mar 15, 2020
Evidence is not conclusive that such a change restores confidence and economic activity.

Coronavirus Cost to Businesses and Workers: 'It Has All Gone to Hell'
Ben Casselman, Patricia Cohen, Stacy Cowley, Conor Dougherty, Nicholas Kulish, David McCabe and Karen Weise (NYT) Mar 15, 2020
As the outbreak forces the cancellation of trips, nights out and large gatherings, economic damage is mounting across the country.

The Federal Reserve Returns to 2008
WSJ Mar 15, 2020
The central bank unleashes the tools it used against the bank solvency crisis against the pandemic liquidity panic.

Let the Fed Administer an Antiviral Shot
Kevin Warsh (WSJ) Mar 15, 2020
An emergency lending program would keep a liquidity crisis from turning into a solvency crisis.

In the markets' volatile swings, a soothing relatability
Megan McArdle (WP) Mar 15, 2020
Markets, much like the humans who participate in them, aren't so much trying to predict the distant future as manage the present.

Fed's 100-Basis-Point Shock Rate Cut Expects the Worst
Brian Chappatta (Bloomberg View) Mar 15, 2020
The central bank hopes for the best but braces for an extended period at the zero lower bound.

By Pumping at Will, Saudi Arabia Hurts Oil Investment
Julian Lee (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 15, 2020
Low oil prices will hurt spending on long-term oil projects everywhere, including in the Gulf.

Inequality and pandemic make an explosive mix
Richard Baldwin (VoxEU) Mar 15, 2020
Estimates by medical experts suggest that the US does not have the hospital capacity to handle a spike in COVID-19 cases as large as the one seen in Italy. Avoiding triage situations at US hospitals is particularly important given the health vulnerability of so many Americans, the incipient rage stemming from decades of economic malaise and rising inequality, and the widespread ownership of guns. The solution is to err on the side of caution by implementing immediate, large-scale social distancing.

Fed howitzer is insufficient, but necessary
Robin Wigglesworth (FT) Mar 16, 2020
US central bank has unleashed a powerful package to tackle the coronavirus fallout.

'Bazookas' cannot stop coronavirus becoming a financial crisis
Patrick Jenkins (FT) Mar 16, 2020
Despite policymakers' efforts there are growing signs that investor confidence is cracking.

Whatever the Fed just did, it may not help much
Trinh Nguyen (FT) Mar 16, 2020
Investors need to consider the fundamental limitations of monetary policy.

Expect oil to rebound but with a low ceiling
Nick Butler (FT) Mar 16, 2020
Coronavirus has caused economic damage but not changed the market fundamentals.

Why FX swap lines are the most important Fed action thus far
Claire Jones and Izabella Kaminska (FT) Mar 16, 2020
They help. But there's some big drawbacks here too such as the risk of the PBoC repo-ing its entire Treasury portfolio for cash.

Sovereign wealth funds proliferate despite lack of sovereign wealth
Steve Johnson (FT) Mar 16, 2020
Cash-strapped South Africa to join Egypt and Turkey in launching state vehicle.

Financing an Economic Shutdown
WSJ Mar 16, 2020
You can't close down an economy without a way to keep business and individuals liquid.

Trump and the Stock Market
WSJ Mar 16, 2020
Reducing the virus spread alone won't address a widening economic shutdown.

A Reckoning for Indebted Companies
George Melloan (WSJ) Mar 16, 2020
Coronavirus volatility is prompting a stress test. Making credit still cheaper will make things worse.

Investors, Keep Your Eye on the Long Run
Sarah Keohane Williamson, Mark D. Wiseman (WSJ) Mar 16, 2020
Markets always come back from major disruptions, though it takes a while.

This Is How the Coronavirus Will Destroy the Economy
Ruchir Sharma (NYT) Mar 16, 2020
This once-in-a-century pandemic is hitting a world economy saddled with record levels of debt.

A global recession is likely here. Lawmakers need to do their jobs.
Catherine Rampell (WP) Mar 16, 2020
Policymakers need to step up and do something useful — yesterday.

Mother Nature and globalization to blame for Covid-19 crisis
Joseph D Terwilliger (AT) Mar 16, 2020
The world must refocus its medical research efforts and stop accusing governments from Beijing to Washington for the pandemic

Garbled supply chains, starved for cash, and hoarding toilet paper
Alvin Powell (Harvard Gazette) Mar 16, 2020
What it will take to restart the global economy reeling from waves of COVID-19 closures.

Policy Action for a Healthy Global Economy
Kristalina Georgieva (IMF) Mar 16, 2020
While quarantining and social distancing is the right prescription to combat COVID-19's public health impact, the exact opposite is needed when it comes to securing the global economy.

Coronavirus Exposes Dependency of Southeast Asia's Manufacturers on China
Manisha Mirchandani (Brink) Mar 16, 2020
Southeast Asian manufacturers hoped the U.S.-China trade war would elevate their position as a global production hub, at the expense of their giant neighbor to the north. But the spread of the coronavirus has brought home the extent to which their fortunes are tightly intertwined with those of China. For multinationals re-examining their supply chains in response to COVID-19, a "China, Plus Two" strategy may be worth considering, with an alternative to China and Southeast Asia in the mix.

The Fed's big guns are welcome, but the United States needs more fiscal action
Joseph E. Gagnon (PIIE) Mar 16, 2020
The Federal Reserve's move on March 15 to drop the federal funds rate another percentage point to essentially zero, along with other steps to support credit markets and the economy, represents a substantial and appropriate easing of monetary policy at a time of health crisis. The announcement at an unusual weekend conference call underscored the urgency of the situation. But no amount of monetary easing can prevent a sharp decline in economic activity in the near term owing to measures taken to slow the spread of the novel coronavirus.

Europe must go big in its macroeconomic response to COVID-19
Jacob Funk Kirkegaard (PIIE) Mar 16, 2020
With more citizens infected than in China, the European Union (EU) is now the world's COVID-19 epicenter. At the same time, by restricting movement more forcefully, Europe is proving that democracies, too, can take many of the measures China had taken. Targeted and free testing widely available across the EU is part of the reason why Europe has a high number of new confirmed COVID-19 cases. European welfare states also generally provide paid sick leave, and European children do not need to rely on their shuttered schools for their main daily meal.

Why OMT is not the solution for Italy right now
Maria Demertzis (Bruegel) Mar 16, 2020
The Outright Monetary Transactions tool is not well suited for Italy right now. Italy needs fiscal support both by itself and by the EU. Italy and the rest of the EU need a fiscal bazooka. We should find a way of backstopping our economies immediately.

Policymakers: Pulling Out All The Stops
Joachim Fels (PIMCO) Mar 16, 2020
Governments and central banks have started to respond more forcefully to the health crisis, enacting policy in an effort to limit long-term damage to the global economy.

Americans Forgot the Economy's Purpose — Until Coronavirus
Joe Nocera (Bloomberg View) Mar 16, 2020
It's to enrich the lives of ordinary citizens, not stockholders and corporations. The White House should take note.

Globalists May Soon Become an Extinct Species
Gary Shilling (Bloomberg View) Mar 16, 2020
The disruptions caused by the spread of the coronavirus mean supply chains will be moved closer to home rather than in foreign lands.

A Fed Decision Only Alan Greenspan Could Love
Daniel Moss (Bloomberg View) Mar 16, 2020
Forget all that transparency and communication mumbo jumbo. Asian central banks in the age of coronavirus must act decisively, too.

The Fed's Barrage Faces Some Obstacles to Success
Mohamed A. El-Erian (Bloomberg View) Mar 16, 2020
The central bank's intervention carries the risk of backfiring.

Oil War May Revive China's Yuan Ambitions
Clara Ferreira Marques (Bloomberg View) Mar 16, 2020
Beijing can use its leverage as the biggest importer to insist on paying for crude in its own currency.

The Post-Trump Agenda
Daron Acemoglu (Project Syndicate) Mar 16, 2020
The stakes in November's US presidential election are high, given how much damage to America and the world a second Trump term could cause. But even if Trump is defeated, Americans must address the deeper problems that made his presidency possible.

The World Is at War
Hans-Werner Sinn (Project Syndicate) Mar 16, 2020
Western countries are finally waking up to the sheer scale of the COVID-19 crisis, and now must marshal a society-wide response. All countries should be following China in confronting the coronavirus directly with all available resources, and they should take a lesson from Germany in managing the economic fallout.

The COVID-19 Debt Deluge
Jayati Ghosh (Project Syndicate) Mar 16, 2020
How long the COVID-19 crisis will last, and what its immediate economic costs will be, is anyone's guess. But even if the pandemic's economic impact is contained, it may have already set the stage for a debt meltdown long in the making, starting in many of the Asian emerging and developing economies on the front lines of the outbreak.

Economic integration and democracy: An empirical investigation
Giacomo Magistretti and Marco Tabellini (VoxDev) Mar 16, 2020
Economic integration can help promote transition to democracy within the world's more autocratic countries through trade with democratic partners.

Off the radar: The rise of shadow banking in Europe
Martin Hodula (VoxEU) Mar 16, 2020
The shadow banking system has become an important source of funding worldwide for the real economy over the last two decades. Europe is no exception, though research on shadow banking there has been relative scarce. This column shows that European shadow banking is highly procyclical, intertwined with insurance corporations and pension funds, and a terminal station for regulatory arbitrage. It also discusses the existence of two main motives that explain the growth of shadow banking, both prior and post-Global Crisis: a funding-cost motive and a search-for-yield motive.

Capital market integration can reduce misallocation: Evidence from India
Natalie Bau and Adrien Matray (VoxEU) Mar 16, 2020
The misallocation of inputs, and in particular capital, may explain the large disparities in productivity across countries. This column exploits a policy in India in the early 2000s to quantify the effects of foreign capital liberalisation on misallocation and aggregate manufacturing productivity. As a result of the liberalisation policies, capital-constrained firms expanded their assets by 60%, spent more on labour (+24%), and increased their revenue by 18% relative to non-constrained firms. The effects of liberalisation were largest in areas with less developed local banking sectors.

Debt and financial crises: Will history repeat itself?
M. Ayhan Kose, Peter Nagle, Franziska Ohnsorge, and Naotaka Sugawara (VoxEU) Mar 16, 2020
The global economy has experienced four waves of rapid debt accumulation in emerging and developing economies over the past 50 years. This column examines these waves of debt and puts the fourth (current) wave in historical context. The current wave of debt, which started in 2010, stands out for its exceptional size, speed, and breadth. While the previous three waves all ended with widespread financial crises, policymakers have a range of options to reduce the likelihood of the current debt wave ending in crisis.

The European Union and democracy must deliver
Group of concerned economists (VoxEU) Mar 16, 2020
The COVID-19 pandemic is an extreme event that threatens the health and economic wellbeing of populations across the globe. This manifesto from a group of Portuguese economists calls for urgent action from the EU to prevent the suffering of its people and to save itself and the democratic values it stands for. A large-scale emergency programme requires massive emergency funding, and in the face of extraordinary circumstances, the ECB must be allowed to finance such a programme.

The Coronavirus Calls for Wartime Economic Thinking
John Cassidy (New Yorker) Mar 16, 2020
"You have to be willing to think what previously would have been unthinkable," one economist said, about the level of stimulus that will be needed to counteract the coronavirus's economic effects.

Will the Coronavirus End Globalization as We Know It?
Henry Farrell and Abraham Newman (FA) Mar 16, 2020
The pandemic is exposing market vulnerabilities no one knew existed.

Another Big Market Collapse Heightens Fears of Global Recession
Keith Johnson (FP) Mar 16, 2020
Fed fails to avert panic over coronavirus impact with no concrete U.S. fiscal stimulus in the offing and little government handle on the outbreak.

The Fed Announces a Barrage of Policy Changes
Jay H. Bryson (WF) Mar 16, 2020
The Federal Reserve surprised many market participants on Sunday when it announced a barrage of policy changes, including a 100 bps cut to the fed funds rate and a re-introduction of QE, along with other policy measures. All of these steps are an effort by the Fed to ease strains in financial markets and cushion the U.S. economy, from the growth-halting effects of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Forecast Update: Global Downturn Imminent
Jay H. Bryson (WF) Mar 16, 2020
Many economies are essentially locking down to combat the spread of the COVID-19 outbreak. Although these steps are necessary from a public health perspective, they likely will have significant economic consequences. We now project that the U.S. economy will fall into a sharp, albeit short-lived, recession in Q2-2020.

Many of the Fastest Growing Areas Take a Hit from COVID-19
Mark Vitner and Charlie Dougherty (WF) Mar 16, 2020
The COVID-19 outbreak has been particularly virulent on the West Coast. Washington and California account for more than one-third of the nation's confirmed cases, with the bulk of cases occurring in major metro areas.

The virus is an economic emergency too
Martin Wolf (FT) Mar 17, 2020
As borrowers and spenders of last resort, governments must act now to avert a depression.

Huge fiscal spending is needed to fight coronavirus downturn
Martin Sandbu (FT) Mar 17, 2020
Far more is required than during the global financial crisis.

The IMF should inject liquidity through SDRs, and fast
Marcos Buscaglia (FT) Mar 17, 2020
Emerging markets are in no position to enact fiscal or monetary stimulus on the scale of 2009.

Coronavirus shows the value of Japan Inc's cash piles
Leo Lewis (FT) Mar 17, 2020
Companies have been hit hard but should use rainy day funds to reward shareholders post-crisis.

Britain's colonial crimes haunt trade negotiations
Jamil Anderlini (FT) Mar 17, 2020
It is unlikely that China or India will agree to a deal on anything but punitive terms.

Parts of the stock market are looking oversold
John Plender (FT) Mar 17, 2020
It is clear that politicians and central bankers are taking measure of the problem.

Trump and Congress are moving in the right direction to save the economy
WP Mar 17, 2020
Lawmakers must move swiftly on large-scale fiscal relief.

The Fiscal Stimulus Panic
WSJ Mar 17, 2020
$1,000 checks won't help the economy, but a new Fed backstop will.

Britain's Better Stimulus
WSJ Mar 17, 2020
Britain's new Chancellor fires a supply-side response to Covid-19.

How to Treat the Financial Symptoms of Covid-19
John H. Cochrane (WSJ) Mar 17, 2020
Federal spending is needed but not enough. Making loans is better than writing checks. Avoid coercion.

Banking for populist times
Brian Caplen (Banker) Mar 17, 2020
When the economic outlook is uncertain, banks need to respond to their customers' concerns and fears.

Be bold now: coronavirus, the Eurogroup and fiscal safety nets
Guntram B. Wolff (Bruegel) Mar 17, 2020
This blog post sketches two scenarios: one in which countries provide a large fiscal safety net to companies and another in which they do not. Both lead to similar debt-to-GDP ratios in 2021, but the safety net leads to a smaller and shorter recession and a quicker rebound. We then discuss how to fund a large response without fragmenting the euro area. Until the lockdowns end, such measures should be implemented.

Tariffs disrupted medical supplies critical to US coronavirus fight
Chad P. Bown (PIIE) Mar 17, 2020
US tariffs on imports from China have threatened to cause shortages of vital medical products used to fight the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). Disrupted supply chains in the medical sector could limit US access to thermometers, CT systems, patient monitors, and other essential items.

The triple economic shock of COVID-19 and priorities for an emergency G-20 leaders meeting
Adam Triggs and Homi Kharas (Brookings) Mar 17, 2020
Every G-20 Summit host is warned that all the careful planning can be overturned in an instant by a global crisis—trade wars and Ukraine struck Argentina, Syria's war overshadowed Turkey's summit, President Trump's election and dismissal of climate change dominated the German G-20. Saudi Arabia's planned agenda is now being pushed aside to make room for an emergency G-20 leaders' meeting in the coming days to deal with the COVID-19 (coronavirus) pandemic.

A letter to Santa, the G7
Alicia García-Herrero and Guntram B. Wolff (Bruegel) Mar 17, 2020
The G7 should set an example of international cooperation and come out with a strong signal of unity and support for the euro-area. Only then will the cost of the crisis be temporary and manageable. This is our letter to Santa. I hope at least some -if not all -of these wishes can be fulfilled.

$1.2 Trillion Isn't Enough to Fix Coronavirus Economic Damage
Mark Gongloff (Bloomberg View) Mar 17, 2020
The downturn could be longer and deeper than we realize.

Trump's $1.2 Trillion Won't Do It. Try $2.5 Trillion
Narayana Kocherlakota (Bloomberg View) Mar 17, 2020
The coming slowdown might be so deep that nothing less will do.

Coronavirus Reopens Fiscal Debate for Brazil and Latin America
Mac Margolis (Bloomberg View) Mar 17, 2020
Should they respond with more spending and state intervention, or hew to budget discipline and economic reforms?

Euro Area's Virus Response Is Still Insufficient
Ferdinando Giugliano (Bloomberg View) Mar 17, 2020
European actions to provide support to deal with the coronavirus outbreak are a start, but they pale in comparison with the size of the shock facing the local and global economy.

When "Whatever It Takes" Isn't Enough
Willem H. Buiter (Project Syndicate) Mar 17, 2020
The US Federal Reserve's surprise weekend announcement of a large interest-rate cut, renewed quantitative easing, and other expansionary measures is a welcome response to the COVID-19 pandemic. But as markets were quick to note, monetary policy cannot save us from this crisis.

A Silent Hero of the Coronavirus Crisis
Pinelopi Koujianou Goldberg (Project Syndicate) Mar 17, 2020
Sometimes, no matter how hard one tries, and no matter how selflessly one sacrifices, one stands no chance against a more powerful enemy. The new coronavirus, COVID-19, has proved to be such a foe, and were it not for technology, the battle against it would have been lost by now.

Helicopter money: The time is now
Jordi Galí (VoxEU) Mar 17, 2020
The measures many countries are taking to contain the spread of coronavirus, while necessary, are bound to have a direct impact on the economy. This column argues that rather than raising taxes and/or increasing government debt to finance the necessary fiscal programmes, the time has come for 'helicopter money' – direct, unrepayable funding by the central bank of the additional fiscal transfers deemed necessary.

Citizenship trade inside the EU: Sovereignty rights need to be realigned
Kai Konrad and Ray Rees (VoxEU) Mar 17, 2020
Small EU states regularly sell 'golden passports' to high net worth individuals, and these citizens thus earn the right to live and work anywhere in the EU. By imagining member states as private clubs and the EU as a 'meta-club', this column presents a model of the effects of this activity. While selling golden passports may be seen as an informal transfer to poorer states, the number of citizenships granted will always be larger than is optimal for the EU as a whole.

The Coming Coronavirus Recession
Mohamed A. El-Erian (FA) Mar 17, 2020
And the uncharted territory beyond.

Rise in Italian yields echoes eurozone debt crisis
Tommy Stubbington (FT) Mar 18, 2020
Lagarde's ill-advised remarks show central bankers' words and actions still matter.

Financial crunch looms as virus shock hits economies
Michael Mackenzie (FT) Mar 18, 2020
With echoes of 2008 getting louder, time is not on the side of central banks or governments.

China lacks the appetite to save the world economy, analysts warn
Don Weinland and James Kynge (FT) Mar 18, 2020
Beijing adopts more conservative approach in tackling latest crisis compared with 2009.

The Federal Reserve must reduce long-term damage from coronavirus
Ben Bernanke and Janet Yellen (FT) Mar 18, 2020
Reviving crisis-era programmes is a first step but the central bank may need to buy corporate bonds

The Economic Rout Accelerates
WSJ Mar 18, 2020
The Fed and Treasury need to liquify business now or liquidate later.

Trump's Tariffs Leave the U.S. Short on Vital Medical Supplies
Robert B. Zoellick (WSJ) Mar 18, 2020
From gloves to respirators, protectionism is raising costs for the providers fighting the coronavirus.

Japanization: 30 Years of Failed Economic "Stimulus"
Taiki Murai and Gunther Schnabl (Mises Wire) Mar 18, 2020
Real wages in Japan have been declining thanks to decades of expansionary monetary and fiscal policies. Now "Japanization" increasingly looks like a fate that awaits Europe.

Italian debt is sustainable
Olivier Blanchard (PIIE) Mar 18, 2020
As European leaders debate issues surrounding a massive financial rescue of Italy, let me make a strong statement. Even with Italy's fiscal response to coronavirus, Italian debt is sustainable. The European Stability Mechanism (ESM), established in the wake of the last European debt crisis a decade ago, should come to this conclusion. Germany should accept it, Italy should be willing to enter a program, and the European Central Bank (ECB) should be willing to use its Outright Monetary Transactions (OMT) bond-purchasing vehicle, while interim measures are taken until OMT is ready to be used.

Coronavirus is no excuse for repeating errors of financial crisis
Patrick Honohan (PIIE) Mar 18, 2020
In facing the sharp economic crisis that is spinning out of the pandemic, European fiscal and monetary policymakers must not forget lessons learned in the 10 years since the euro area crisis got under way. There can be no excuse for repeating the errors that were made then.

What should be done to reduce euro-area spreads?
Grégory Claeys (Bruegel) Mar 18, 2020
Spreads are rising again in the euro-area at the worst possible time, when fiscal policy is needed to fight the coronavirus pandemic and the related economic shock. This blog post reviews the main options available to European policymakers, their feasibility and potential effectiveness to deal with this issue.

Development Finance Institutions Should Be Instruments of Public Policy, Not Private Gain
Charles Kenny (CGD) Mar 18, 2020
The World Bank Group has some very clear (and very good) guidelines about what makes for a successful public-private partnership where governments contract service provision like energy supply or education from private firms. When it comes to World Bank financed operations in support of such partnerships, the rule is simple: use competition to award the contract. Sadly, the bank has been ignoring that rule recently. And that is a sign of a broader problem in donor-backed financing of public-private partnership deals.

Financialization: Why the Financial Sector Now Rules the Global Economy
Ryan McMaken (Mises Wire) Mar 18, 2020
"Financialization" is the process by which a normal economy is transformed into a fragile economy centered around financial firms. Central banks and government bailouts are to blame.

Economic Fallout: Here Comes Congress?
Libby Cantrill and Tiffany Wilding (PIMCO) Mar 18, 2020
A bolder fiscal response to the rapidly spreading coronavirus has become an economic and political imperative.

The case for a derivative market programme
Sybrand Brekelmans and Francesco Papadia (Bruegel) Mar 18, 2020
The implementation of a Derivative Market Programme could reaffirm the ECB's credibility and strong commitment to price stability.

Worries Ease About U.S. Economic Response to Virus
Mohamed A. El-Erian (Bloomberg View) Mar 18, 2020
The U.S. is making progress, but it can't avert a sharp recession.

Big Business Has All the Advantages in the Pandemic
Conor Sen (Bloomberg View) Mar 18, 2020
Even now, some of them are hiring and expanding while small companies are getting crushed.

The Coronavirus Recession Is Already Here
Karl W. Smith (Bloomberg View) Mar 18, 2020
Preliminary numbers from the states show a truly staggering volume of job losses.

Private Equity Has the Cash, and It Is King
Nisha Gopalan (Bloomberg View) Mar 18, 2020
Firms that sat on their hands as valuations remained high in Asia can now expect their pick of bargains.

Mad Markets Offer Last-Chance Saloon for Active Funds
Mark Gilbert (Bloomberg View) Mar 18, 2020
If stock pickers can't outperform indexes in the current volatility, they should shut up shop.

Dollar Funding Is Freezing Up, and the Fed Knows It
Shuli Ren (Bloomberg View) Mar 18, 2020
The central bank's latest measures don't go far enough to ease the flow of credit around the world.

Cheap Sterling Has Reasons to Be Cheaper
Marcus Ashworth (Bloomberg View) Mar 18, 2020
The British currency is suffering because of the U.K.'s vulnerability from being a services economy and lacking a safe-haven crisis. A near-term reversal is hard to see.

This Is Starting to Look More Like a Financial Crisis
Mark Gongloff (Bloomberg View) Mar 18, 2020
Stopping the flow of people is stopping the flow of cash.

Compound Growth Could Kill Us – or Make Us Stronger
Gernot Wagner (Project Syndicate) Mar 18, 2020
The power of compound growth has long been recognized as essential to economic development. But in both the COVID-19 pandemic and the slower-moving climate crisis, this same mathematical force is cutting the other way, revealing dangerous shortcomings in how we manage externalities.

What COVID-19 Means for International Aid
Arvind Subramanian (Project Syndicate) Mar 18, 2020
The COVID-19 pandemic highlights the need for a radical revamp of the international aid architecture, so that massive amounts of money can be devoted to global public goods. And some of this will have to be financed by reducing existing country lending.

Containing the Dollar Credit Crunch
Philip Turner (Project Syndicate) Mar 18, 2020
As the full implications of the COVID-19 pandemic have slowly become clear, private liquidity has begun to drain out of global markets. As a result, the record-high level of dollar-denominated debt held by non-banking entities outside of the United States has become a problem that central banks simply cannot ignore.

The ECB Must Finance COVID-19 Deficits
Paul De Grauwe (Project Syndicate) Mar 18, 2020
Having witnessed the 2008 financial crisis and the subsequent eurozone debt crisis, Europe's policymakers should already realize what the COVID-19 pandemic could mean for the economy. To avert a self-perpetuating downward spiral, the European Central Bank, in particular, will need to start thinking outside the box.

Europe Is Unprepared for the COVID-19 Recession
Yanis Varoufakis (Project Syndicate) Mar 18, 2020
If there is one European body that has consistently demonstrated its lack of fitness for managing economic crises, it is the Eurogroup of eurozone finance ministers. True to form, it will respond to the COVID-19 crisis with heroic announcements heralding impressive numbers that disguise the irrelevance and timidity of the agreed policies.

The Coronavirus Could Reshape Global Order
Kurt M. Campbell and Rush Doshi (FA) Mar 18, 2020
China is maneuvering for international leadership as the United States falters.

Is the Coronavirus Crash Worse Than the 2008 Financial Crisis?
Adam Tooze (FP) Mar 18, 2020
The last global economic crisis was a financial heart attack. This one might be a full-body seizure.

The Coronavirus Shutdown Slashed China's Household Finances
Christopher Aston (FP) Mar 18, 2020
Xi Jinping is desperate to get the economy back to life.

An Economic-History Lesson for Dealing with the Coronavirus
John Cassidy (New Yorker) Mar 18, 2020
The professor Barry Eichengreen on what the Great Depression and the 1918 flu pandemic can teach us about how the U.S. can recover from financial crises.

Rapid Rate Cuts and Extreme Easing
Nick Bennenbroek (WF) Mar 18, 2020
The past week has seen an avalanche of global monetary policy easing, including from the European Central Bank and Bank of England, with most central banks also signaling they are prepared to ease further as needed.

Central Banks in Brazil and South Africa Up Next
Brendan McKenna (WF) Mar 18, 2020
Central banks have eased monetary policy aggressively over the past few weeks as the COVID-19 virus continues to spread and disrupt economies and financial markets. As a result of easier monetary policy from the Fed and other major central banks, central banks in emerging economies have started pursuing lower interest rates as well.

Is the Federal Reserve Out of Ammunition?
Jay H. Bryson and Michael Pugliese (WF) Mar 18, 2020
In this report, we discuss what policy tools remain at the Fed's disposal to combat a period of economic weakness that appears to be in train in the U.S. economy.

Relocating or Redefined: A New Perspective on Urbanization in China
Li Gan, Qing He, Ruichao Si, and Daichun Yi (VoxEU) Mar 18, 2020
We study the urbanization process in China during the past decade by deconstructing different sources of new urban residents. We find that around one-third of urban population growth in the past decade has consisted of redefined migrants from communities that have been reclassified from rural to urban, though they do not actually move. We further find evidence that failing to consider the number of redefined migrants and their housing behaviors leads to a high housing vacancy rate in China's urban areas.

The impact of the China-US trade agreement on developing countries
Caroline Freund, Maryla Maliszewska, Aaditya Mattoo, and Michele Ruta (VoxEU) Mar 18, 2020
Should the China-US trade agreement prompt relief or concern? This column argues that the answer depends on how China implements the agreement. Model simulations suggest that both countries would be better off under this 'managed trade' agreement than if the trade war had escalated. However, compared to the policy status quo, China is worse off and so is the rest of the world because of trade diversion. China can reverse those losses if instead of granting the US privileged entry, it opens its market for all trading partners.

Anticipating the financial crisis: Evidence from insider trading in banks
Ozlem Akin, José M. Marín, and José-Luis Peydró (VoxEU)/I> Mar 18, 2020
There is a broad discussion surrounding the excessive risk-taking by banks and whether this constitutes a reliable early warning signal for future banking problems. This column presents evidence that many top executives of US banks sold their own shares in the buildup to the Global Crisis. This trends appears to be stronger for banks with higher real estate exposure, and weaker for independent directors or middle officers. Although the top bankers in riskier banks sold more shares, thus furthering their own interests, they did not reduce bank risk exposure.

The case for a coordinated COVID-19 response: No country is an island
Claudia Biancotti, Alessandro Borin, Federico Cingano, Pietro Tommasino, and Giovanni Veronese (VoxEU) Mar 18, 2020
Governments around the world are tackling the COVID-19 pandemic from different angles. This column, by members of the Bank of Italy's COVID-19 monitoring group, argues that in the absence of coordinated containment measures, the most likely outcome is the worst of both worlds: preventable loss of lives and of GDP. Predictability and consistency in policy responses across space and time is key, both in the public health and economic domains. Effective cooperation in avoiding a 'common bad' might be able to endow the world with the crucial common good of a more complete and effective governance. The European Union should be the first to set an example.

Mitigating the COVID Economic Crisis: Act Fast and Do Whatever It Takes
Richard Baldwin and Beatrice Weder di Mauro (VoxEU) Mar 18, 2020
Leading economists from around the world are calling for swift policy action to mitigate the economic damage from the global pandemic. In this second eBook on the coronavirus from CEPR and Vox, the experts are unanimous that the case for decisive and coordinated fiscal stimulus is overwhelming.

Fed must act to keep markets functioning
FT View Mar 19, 2020
US and other central banks need to ease the intensifying squeeze on dollar funding.

National action cannot fix a global pandemic
Philip Stephens (FT) Mar 19, 2020
US, China and Europe must work together to defeat coronavirus.

China's property sector is at the epicentre of the crisis
Paul Hodges and Daniël de Blocq van Scheltinga (FT) Mar 19, 2020
Indebted developers threaten a domino effect on western credit markets.

World is awash with more debt than it can handle
Michael Howell (FT) Mar 19, 2020
QE worked in 2008 and it will work again now, ideally alongside fiscal measures.

It's time to practice social and economic distancing from China
Marc Thiessen (WP) Mar 19, 2020
The coronavirus crisis has also exposed just how dependent we have become on China in key sectors of our economy.

Rethinking the Coronavirus Shutdown
WSJ Mar 19, 2020
No society can safeguard public health for long at the cost of its economic health.

Can Lagarde Save the Euro?
WSJ Mar 19, 2020
The European Central Bank buys the eurozone as much time as it can.

How to prevent a covid-19 slump, and protect the recovery
Economist Mar 19, 2020
Governments need to be able to dial financial support up and down for people and firms.

Why America's financial plumbing has seized up
Economist Mar 19, 2020
Central-bank action is failing to stem the rout.

Governments are spending big to keep the world economy from getting dangerously sick
Economist Mar 19, 2020
The help is targeted at companies and individuals. More will be needed.

Economies can rebound quickly from massive GDP slumps—but not always
Economist Mar 19, 2020
History suggests full recovery takes, on average, about five years.

Companies struggle as virus infects economies
Richard Lein (AT) Mar 19, 2020
A broad spectrum of firms have been hit hard as Covid-19 brings business to a grinding halt.

EU limits on medical gear exports put poor countries and Europeans at risk
Chad P. Bown (PIIE) Mar 19, 2020
Faced with dangerous shortages at a time of health crisis, the European Union (EU) has announced emergency export restrictions on some hospital supplies that its medical workers need to fight the COVID-19 pandemic. The unexpected policy limits European companies' sales of an estimated $12.1 billion of medical gear to countries outside the European single market.

COVID-19 and broken Collusion: the oil price collapse is one more warning for Russia
Niclas Poitiers and Marta Domínguez-Jiménez (Bruegel) Mar 19, 2020
In the midst of the COVID-19 epidemic, the sharp collapse in the oil price has received little attention. Brent fell by 30% on 9 March, the largest fall since the 1991 Gulf War. The Russian ruble followed suit and its tumble highlights Russia's continued dependence on resource extraction. The episode should be taken as a sign of things to come in a world where Russia's main customers are going green.

The human capital paradox: A measurement issue?
Jaroslava Botev, Balázs Égert, Zuzana Smidova and David Turner (OECD) Mar 19, 2020
Human capital is widely regarded as a fundamental input in the theoretical growth literature. Recommendations to boost it feature prominently among reform priorities for a great number of countries (Figure 1). Yet, paradoxically, quantifying the macroeconomic effects of human capital has often proven frustratingly elusive.

The Economic Response We Need to the Coronavirus
Michael R. Bloomberg (Bloomberg View) Mar 19, 2020
A strong recovery requires immediate relief to be coupled with long-term investment.

Want More Ventilators? Roll Back Trump's Tariffs
Brooke Sutherland (Bloomberg View) Mar 19, 2020
The duties are an unnecessary tax on already-strained manufacturers, some of which may be key to helping in the coronavirus fight.

Lagarde's Bazooka Isn't Big Enough for This Crisis
John Authers (Bloomberg View) Mar 19, 2020
Central banks are doing all they can. Governments need to respond with fiscal policy.

Bond Markets Are Veering Into a Vicious Cycle
Brian Chappatta (Bloomberg View) Mar 19, 2020
Unprecedented mutual-fund outflows will exacerbate the stampede out of corporate and municipal debt already set in motion by the coronavirus outbreak.

Eurobonds Aren't What Europe Needs Right Now
Ferdinando Giugliano (Bloomberg View) Mar 19, 2020
It's a nice dream, but a completely unrealistic one in the face of a pressing crisis.

An Adventure in Economic Wonderland Comes to an End
Daniel Moss (Bloomberg View) Mar 19, 2020
Australia's central bank is deploying its monetary firepower in ways that once seemed unfathomable. A 28-year expansion is at risk.

Christine Lagarde Is Third-Time Lucky
Ferdinando Giugliano (Bloomberg View) Mar 19, 2020
After a very slow start, the ECB is showing it's ready to do "whatever it takes" to protect the euro-zone economy in the face of the Covid-19 epidemic.

How America Can Come Back Even Stronger From Coronavirus
Mark Gongloff (Bloomberg View) Mar 19, 2020
We shouldn't let this crisis go to waste.

Just Looking Out for No. 1 Is Wrong Way to Defeat the Virus
Mohamed A. El-Erian (Bloomberg View) Mar 19, 2020
The post-crisis landscape will look much better with collective action.

A Pandemic Strategy as Global as COVID-19
Erik Berglöf (Project Syndicate) Mar 19, 2020
As the COVID19 outbreak spreads, governments are understandably working to protect their own populations first, including by closing their borders and imposing quarantines and lockdowns. But, in doing so, they are often failing to see the bigger picture – with potentially dire consequences.

Only Multilateralism Can Save Us
Anne O. Krueger (Project Syndicate) Mar 19, 2020
Between a coronavirus pandemic and collapsing stock markets, the global economy may be in a worse situation than it was during the 2008 financial crisis, because America has all but slammed the door shut on international cooperation. And yet, without a multilateral response, the US will suffer as much as anyone.

The False Crisis Comparison
Stephen S. Roach (Project Syndicate) Mar 19, 2020
During the 2008 crisis, unprecedented actions by the US Federal Reserve were both appropriate and decisive in addressing the primary source of the shock: a devastating blow to the financial system. In the COVID-19 crisis, the Fed cannot play the same role, because it is addressing the financial repercussions of a shock to the real economy.

The COVID-19 Cash Out
Juergen Braunstein , Marion Laboure, and Sachin Silva (Project Syndicate) Mar 19, 2020
While Chinese authorities have been destroying banknotes that have potentially come into contact with the coronavirus, Western countries remain woefully behind not just in their response to the pandemic, but also in adopting digital payments. One silver lining to the COVID-19 crisis is that this may soon change.

Averting Economic Disaster Is the Easy Part
Anatole Kaletsky (Project Syndicate) Mar 19, 2020
Based on China's experience with COVID-19, the fiscal cost of comprehensive compensation for lost income could reach 10% of annual GDP, and as much as 25% of GDP in the US and Europe if the epidemic turns out to be worse there, which now looks likely. These may seem like mind-boggling sums, but they can be financed in several ways.

Export restraints on medical supplies during a pandemic
Simon Evenett (VoxEU) Mar 19, 2020
Given the centrality of China to many international supply chains, there is considerable interest in the impact of COVID-19 on global trade flows. And a troubling trade policy dimension is now coming to light. This column reports on and assesses a finding of the Global Trade Alert that 24 nations have recently imposed export restrictions on medical supplies.

Do Saudi Arabia, Russia Target US Shale Industry?
Dilip Hiro (YaleGlobal) Mar 19, 2020
Oil giants remove checks from oil production levels, damaging the indebted US shale oil industry.

A Coronavirus Economic War Mobilization Plan
Jack Rasmus (WFR) Mar 19, 2020
During World War II the US lost about 500,000. The enemies were afar, offshore. Today the Coronavirus is projected to eventually kill at least twice that number Americans. The enemy has already effectively shut down much of our economy, is making millions jobless, threatening to sabotage our banking & financial system.

China Casts Itself as Global Savior While U.S. and EU Focus on Virus at Home
Morten Soendergaard Larsen and Robbie Gramer (FP) Mar 19, 2020
As Western countries battle with their own domestic epidemic, a newly stabilized China seizes a chance to portray itself as the emerging superpower. Will it work?

How Can We Quantify the Potential Loss in U.S. Income?
Michael Pugliese and Hop Mathews (WF) Mar 19, 2020
One of the biggest challenges for analysts and policymakers alike is the difficulty in quantifying the unprecedented shut down of large parts of the U.S. economy. Just how big might the hole in the economy be?

Could Business Failures Cause A Banking Crisis?
Jay H. Bryson and Hop Mathews (WP) Mar 19, 2020
In this report, we delve into whether or not banks would be able to handle a potential wave of defaults in the business sector.

ECB and Bank of England deploy their big bazookas
FT View Mar 20, 2020
Central banks' bold action has put the onus on politicians to protect jobs.

Rich countries cannot win the war against coronavirus alone
Raghuram Rajan (FT) Mar 20, 2020
We need to fight this pandemic into submission everywhere in order to relax measures anywhere.

Scientists should take lessons from economists on virus response
Chris Giles (FT) Mar 20, 2020
To proclaim 'we will do the right thing at the right time' is nonsense. There is no polite way of putting it.

Toilet rolls and Treasury bonds tell the same panicked story
Gillian Tett (FT) Mar 20, 2020
Bond fund investors are running for the exits amid 'rising illiquidity'.

Downgrades are just one sign of 'ugly' credit market
Joe Rennison (FT) Mar 20, 2020
Occidental's fall from triple B to double B is likely to be one of many.

The ECB will do everything necessary
Christine Lagarde (FT) Mar 20, 2020
We are ready to increase the size of our asset purchase programmes.

Recession and demand shock expectations hit miners
Neil Hume (FT) Mar 20, 2020
Share prices could fall further in near term but strong fundamentals provide support.

Stock market crashes: lessons from history
Merryn Somerset Webb (FT) Mar 20, 2020
The hum of the helicopters needs to start getting louder.

We're about to find out how smart the banks have been
Robert Armstrong (FT) Mar 20, 2020
Fears over coronavirus effects have battered share prices, especially for card lenders.

Surging dollar, coronavirus and oil slump hit emerging economies
Jonathan Wheatley (FT) Mar 20, 2020
Higher debt and deficits inhibit countries' scope to turn to crisis-era stimulus.

Coronavirus fightback will make lasting changes to economies
Michael Mackenzie (FT) Mar 20, 2020
Investors trying to call the bottom of the market rout face a daunting task.

How to Avoid Complete Economic Destruction
NYT Mar 20, 2020
To limit mass unemployment, the government needs to provide companies with the money they are temporarily unable to earn.

Leaderless on the Economy
WSJ Mar 20, 2020
Markets aren't getting a clear picture of what Treasury wants and why.

Should the Government Buy Stocks?
WSJ Mar 20, 2020
Japan shows that federal equity purchases would be an epic blunder.

How many TARPs does it take to cover a crisis?
David P. Goldman (AT) Mar 20, 2020
Governments and central banks have held the line but the intervention may not be sufficient.

Blunting the Impact and Hard Choices: Early Lessons from China
Helge Berger, Kenneth Kang, and Changyong Rhee (IMF) Mar 20, 2020
The impact of the coronavirus is having a profound and serious impact on the global economy and has sent policymakers looking for ways to respond. China's experience so far shows that the right policies make a difference in fighting the disease and mitigating its impact—but some of these policies come with difficult economic tradeoffs.

Coronavirus Ushers in the Globalization We Were Afraid Of
Robert D. Kaplan (Bloomberg View) Mar 20, 2020
Welcome to a new age of decreasing free trade and global cooperation, and rising nationalism and geopolitical rivalry.

Coronavirus Foists a New Normal on Manufacturers
Brooke Sutherland (Bloomberg View) Mar 20, 2020
The pandemic is shaking up everything from the supply chain to how companies allocate capital.

The U.S. Must Protect Free Markets in the Oil Price War
Ryan Sitton (Bloomberg View) Mar 20, 2020
Texas is poised to benefit from stabilizing global supply, but it needs the federal government to make a deal.

ECB Undid a Fail But Left Collateral Damage
Mark Gilbert and Marcus Ashworth (Bloomberg View) Mar 20, 2020
The central bank was right to revise its response to the coronavirus. But policy u-turns damage bond liquidity just when governments need a well-functioning market.

Global Banks Get Stressed Like Never Before
Elisa Martinuzzi (Bloomberg View) Mar 20, 2020
Banks meet a likely recession in a stronger position than during the financial crisis. But hopes they will alleviate rather than exacerbate the downturn may prove overdone.

A Look at Economies and Markets After Covid-19
Gary Shilling (Bloomberg View) Mar 20, 2020
Once the coronavirusis is defeated, the new normal will be marked by much slower growth, the risk of deflation and a distrust of equities.

The Most Realistic Economic Forecast Is Awful
Narayana Kocherlakota (Bloomberg View) Mar 20, 2020
Predictions of a second-half rebound are based on dubious assumptions.

What the G20 Must Do
Paola Subacchi (Project Syndicate) Mar 20, 2020
With the coronavirus outbreak having now become a full-blown pandemic that is threatening both the global economy and millions of lives, an international coordinated response is desperately needed. As in the 2008 financial crisis, the G20 must take the lead, starting with its emergency virtual summit next week.

The Sino-American Scramble for Africa
Colin Coleman (Project Syndicate) Mar 20, 2020
Not only do Africa's economic-development indicators lag far behind those of many other regions, but the continent also has a demographic time bomb on its hands. If the rest of the world, particularly its largest economies, do not engage constructively with the continent, Africa's problems will become global problems.

Coping with disasters: Lessons from two centuries of international response
Sebastian Horn, Carmen Reinhart, and Christoph Trebesch (VoxEU) Mar 20, 2020
The world is coping with a global disaster, as the new Coronavirus takes a toll on many lost lives and a severe impact on economic activity. To provide a long-run perspective, this column documents the international response to a variety of disasters since 1790. Based on a new comprehensive database on loans extended by governments and central banks, official (sovereign-to-sovereign) international lending is much larger than generally known. Official lending spikes in times of global turmoil, such as wars, financial crises or natural disasters. Indeed, in these periods, official capital flows have repeatedly surpassed total private capital flows in the past two centuries. Wars, in particular, were accompanied by large surges in the volume of official cross-border lending.

Coronavirus meets the Great Influenza Pandemic
Robert Barro, Jose Ursua, and Joanna Weng (VoxEU) Mar 20, 2020
What is a plausible worst-case scenario for outcomes under COVID-19? This column draws lessons from the 1918-1920 Great Influenza Pandemic. Data for 43 countries imply flu-related deaths back then of 39 million, 2% of the world population, implying 150 million deaths when applied to current population. Controlling for effects from WWI, GDP and consumption in the typical country declined by 6% and 8%, respectively, while real returns on stocks and short-term government bills fell meaningfully. Large potential losses in lives and economic activity justify current policy actions to limit the damage, but there is a difficult tradeoff between mortality and lost output, and this tradeoff warrants discussion that is absent so far.

Meanwhile, America's Kosovo Strategy Is Melting Down
Edward P. Joseph (FP) Mar 20, 2020
As the coronavirus pandemic raises tensions, the Trump administration's strategy of bowing to Serbia's authoritarian president is coming completely undone.

The Next Wave
Colum Lynch and Robbie Gramer (FP) Mar 20, 2020
The United Nations is attempting to raise $1.5 billion to help countries with existing humanitarian crises respond to the coronavirus pandemic. Without it, they fear an even bigger path of destruction.

Global policymaking has cranked into gear
FT View Mar 21, 2020
The next stage of crisis firefighting is to safeguard companies and jobs.

Government loan guarantees are an obvious virus fix
Steven Abrahams (FT) Mar 21, 2020
Banks could make state-backed loans to stressed but creditworthy borrowers.

Coronavirus Recession Looms, Its Course 'Unrecognizable'
Nelson D. Schwartz (NYT) Mar , 2020
The U.S. economic outlook darkens daily, with millions facing unemployment and businesses in a steep decline.

Investors Will Emerge From 'Fog of War' in Unfamiliar Terrain
Mohamed A. El-Erian (Bloomberg View) Mar 21, 2020
The coronavirus shock brings with it a growing list of uncertainties that may transform the financial landscape.

A recession is a public health necessity – let's keep it short
Steven Hamilton and Stan Veuger (VoxEU) Mar 21, 2020
The threat posed by the pandemic cannot be addressed simply by relying on Keynesian demand stimuli. This column explores the notion of using public spending to build a bridge for businesses during this unprecedented period. The EU needs to be open to a variety of new policy measures to meet the challenge head on, perhaps even turning to Eurobonds to deal with lingering fiscal sustainability concerns going forward.

Coronavirus perceptions and economic anxiety
Thiemo Fetzer, Lukas Hensel, Johannes Hermle, and Chris Roth (VoxEU) Mar 21, 2020
There is a risk that economic anxiety over the coronavirus crisis will fuel a long-term economic downturn. This column uses Google search activity and individual survey data to document a rapid increase in economic anxiety in the US in response to the initial global spreading of the virus. Survey respondents tended to overestimate the mortality and contagiousness of COVID-19, but underestimated the non-linear nature of how infectious diseases spread. This suggests that information and public education may play a central role in containment and in managing the negative economic impact of increased economic anxiety.

Corporate debt burdens threaten economic recovery after COVID-19
Bo Becker, Ulrich Hege, and Pierre Mella-Barral (VoxEU) Mar 21, 2020
The coronavirus pandemic is likely to lead to a steep, and potentially protracted, economic downturn. In response, many countries have implemented ambitious packages to support households and businesses. This column argues that in light of already elevated debt burdens, provisions for future debt restructuring should be made as soon as possible. These include carefully designed bailout packages, speedier in-court insolvency proceedings, and a stronger role of the state in dealing with renegotiations. Failure to plan and prepare for these cases could lead to a much slower economic recovery.

A proposal for a Covid Credit Line
Agnès Bénassy-Quéré, Arnoud Boot, Antonio Fatás, Marcel Fratzscher, Clemens Fuest, Francesco Giavazzi, Ramon Marimon, Philippe Martin, Jean Pisani-Ferry, Lucrezia Reichlin, Dirk Schoenmaker, Pedro Teles, and Beatrice Weder di Mauro (VoxEU) Mar 21, 2020
It is in the interest of every EU member state that countries in the Union hit by the coronavirus are able to take the necessary measures to control the pandemic and deal with the economic consequences without being constrained, and to do so very quickly. This column proposes a Covid credit line in the European Stability Mechanism, with allocation across member states proportionate to the severity of the public health and economic challenges encountered. While it would involve some coordination and solidarity among member states, the dedicated credit line would reduce risks to economic and financial stability for all while allowing members to sustain their efforts by making their borrowing costs less dependent on individual fiscal situations.

Europe needs a new scale of stimulus — and cash not credit
Wolfgang Münchau (FT) Mar 22, 2020
Direct payments should be made to citizens and companies.

A strategy for dysfunctional US Treasuries market
Gavyn Davies (FT) Mar 22, 2020
Fed could try yield curve control on bonds, as Japan and Australia have done.

Force global banks to suspend payouts
Sheila Bair (FT) Mar 22, 2020
This simple step would free up trillions of dollars of additional lending capacity.

Why coronavirus could hit Iran harder than US sanctions
Andrew England and Najmeh Bozorgmehr (FT) Mar 22, 2020
The outbreak may throttle many of the new trading relationships on which Tehran depends.

A Washington Liquidity Infusion
WSJ Mar 22, 2020
The Senate virus bill may help the economy stave off a depression.

Restraints on Short Selling Wouldn't Calm Markets
Bryan Corbett (WSJ) Mar 22, 2020
It will do the opposite. Studies show that restrictions exacerbate price volatility.

A debt jubilee is the only way to avoid a depression
Michael Hudson (WP) Mar 22, 2020
A debt crisis was inevitable, but covid-19 has made it immediate.

Social Distancing Makes Sense Only With Extraordinary Fiscal Stimulus
Peter R. Orszag (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 22, 2020
Governments' economic measures to address Covid-19 need to be much bigger.

The Coronavirus Won't Kill Globalization
James Gibney (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 22, 2020
The challenge, as ever, is how to navigate a changing global balance of power.

To Stop the Oil Price War, Trump Must Step in to Strike a Deal
Julian Lee (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 22, 2020
The oil glut, like the health and economic crises, needs a global solution and a global leader.

Refusing Free Money Is a Sign of Fear
Andy Mukherjee (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 22, 2020
A vital indicator of a dollar squeeze is flashing red. It means trouble for banks.

The Decline and Fall of the Gulf's Oil Empire Is Looming
David Fickling (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 22, 2020
Price wars may have little bearing on the inevitable crash in wealth.

The supply side matters: Guns versus butter, COVID-style
Richard Baldwin (VoxEU) Mar 22, 2020
"Go big. Act fast. Keep the lights on" is good advice for governments trying to flatten the epidemiological and recession curves simultaneously. This column argues that the combination of containment policies that dampen production and stimulus policies that maintain spending will generate supply-side problems. Cost-push inflation may return, political pressures for price controls and rationing may be irresistible, and governments may find themselves engaged in thinking about production and logistics of the type not undertaken since the 1940s.

'Stress tests' for banks as liquidity insurers in a time of COVID
Viral Acharya and Sascha Steffen (VoxEU) Mar 22, 2020
Stock prices have declined and credit market conditions have tightened in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Firms typically respond to such outcomes by exercising their liquidity insurance and drawing down their credit lines. This column uses two 'stress tests' to demonstrate that the quantum of credit commitments likely to move onto banks' balance sheets should be manageable thanks to the healthier capitalisation of banks relative to before the Global Crisis. However, in a severely adverse scenario, the average Tier 1 capital to risk-weighted assets ratio of banks will likely move closer to the regulatory minimum of 8% and well below for some banks. Regulators should plan in advance for such a severe stress test by ensuring that banks prevent any further capital depletion through dividend payouts or share buybacks.

Pandemics and social capital
Arnstein Aassve, Guido Alfani, Francesco Gandolfi, and Marco Le Moglie (VoxEU) Mar 22, 2020
Long-term effects of a pandemic go well beyond the demographic losses. This column uses a representative survey of the US population in the aftermath of the Spanish flu to evaluate the permanent consequences of the pandemic on individual behaviour. It finds that social disruption during the period led to long-term deterioration in social trust, which had important economic consequences. The findings highlight the importance of a strong response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Coronavirus risks calamity for the emerging world
FT View Mar 23, 2020
Support for poorer countries is not just a moral but a practical imperative.

Why markets gave a big shrug to the Bank of Japan
Shigeto Nagai (FT) Mar 23, 2020
Central bank's arsenal of monetary policy weapons is looking much depleted.

This time, small guys should get the bailouts
Rana Foroohar (FT) Mar 23, 2020
Many run tight margins as it is and would not be able to survive additional debt burden.

Coronavirus threatens $32tn of Asia corporate debt
Jamie Smyth, Don Weinland, John Reed, and Primrose Riordan (FT) Mar 23, 2020
Outbreak sparks cash crunch across region and fears of widespread bankruptcies.

How to prepare for a longer crisis
Laurence Boone (FT) Mar 23, 2020
An outbreak lasting more than a few months would require extending short-term responses.

For Now, Pay Workers to Stay Home
Edward Glaeser (WSJ) Mar 23, 2020
Service employees need aid during the lockdowns, but long-term cash transfers would leave them worse off.

Risk, Uncertainty and Coronavirus
Allison Schrager (WSJ) Mar 23, 2020
We don't have enough data to know whether drastic lockdowns are worth the economic damage.

Volatility Ain't What It Used to Be
Heath Tarbert (WSJ) Mar 23, 2020
Derivatives markets are functioning well and acting as shock absorbers during a time of market ups and downs.

The U.S. must also treat the economic prosperity side of public health
Charles Lane (WP) Mar 23, 2020
It's unclear whether these pillars of the global economy can withstand what might lie ahead.

The European Central Bank Is Being Stretched to Its Breaking Point in Italy
Fabrizio Ferrari (Mises Wire) Mar 23, 2020
At this point, monetary policy can't save Italy. Promises from Europe's central bank have allowed Italian policymakers to avoid coming to terms with Italy's bankrupt reality. Until now.

COVID-19 Pandemic and the Middle East and Central Asia: Region Facing Dual Shock
Jihad Azour (IMF) Mar 23, 2020
Uncertainty about the nature and duration of the shocks has complicated the policy response.

The Fed expands its emergency lending facilities again
Joseph E. Gagnon (PIIE) Mar 23, 2020
Faced with mounting dangers to the US economy, the Federal Reserve announced several new steps on March 23, 2020, to ensure adequate flows of credit through the financial system. These steps add to measures announced a week earlier by expanding the sectors of the economy to which the Fed is providing credit, going even further than the measures taken in the Great Recession of 2008–09. The initial size of the new facilities is only $300 billion, an amount too small given the magnitude of the problem. But the Fed rescue will most likely be expanded as Congress authorizes more funds for the Treasury Department to backstop the Fed. For now, it's important to get these facilities up and running.

The triple economic shock of COVID-19 and priorities for an emergency G-20 leaders meeting
Adam Triggs and Homi Kharas (Brookings) Mar 23, 2020
This is why the G-20 was created. Its leaders must rise to the challenge. Global priorities to combat the three simultaneous economic shocks of the coronavirus pandemic.

A memo to trade ministers on how trade policy can help fight COVID-19
Anabel González (PIIE) Mar 23, 2020
Lower tariffs on pharmaceuticals, medical devices, and other medical supplies.

Coronavirus and the World Economy: What to Expect?
Holger Schmieding (Globalist) Mar 23, 2020
An unprecedented economic policy response to an extreme medical emergency.

Was Germany Right to Hoard Its Money After All?
Andreas Kluth and Ferdinando Giugliano (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 23, 2020
Fiscal hawks say Berlin's balanced budget is why it has so much cash to splash around now. But that ignores Germany's special role in the euro zone.

The Fed Should Never Lend to Anyone Other Than Banks
Narayana Kocherlakota (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 23, 2020
By extending credit to nonfinancial companies, the central bank sacrifices its independence to do the White House's bidding.

Balance-Sheet Stress Worsens Bailout Dilemma
Mohamed A. El-Erian (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 23, 2020
Corporate bankruptcies would worsen the economic downturn, but the mechanics and politics of relief are complex.

A Doyen of Globalization Makes Its Final Retreat
Nisha Gopalan (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 23, 2020
The world changed, and Li & Fung didn't change enough.

Metals Buckle Under Virus Double Whammy
Clara Ferreira Marques (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 23, 2020
After an unprecedented blow to global demand, lockdowns threaten to choke off supply, too.

Unshackle the Banks to Prevent a Deep Recession
Daniel Babich (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 23, 2020
Much has been done in recent days to bolster financial instituions, but there's one big thing left to do.

A Way to Help Keep the COVID-19 Economy Working
Mark Roe (Project Syndicate) Mar 23, 2020
If the economy is to be saved before the pandemic wipes it out, it will happen on the public-health front. And here, the least important medically of the three major biomedical channels now in play may well be the one that could impede economic Armageddon.

Saudi Arabia's Radical New Oil Strategy
Bernard Haykel (Project Syndicate) Mar 23, 2020
Although Saudi Arabia's recent decision to hike oil production coincided with the broader COVID-19 crisis, it reflects a broader and more fundamental strategic shift led by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. With a global clean-energy transition inevitable, MBS is desperate to cash out while the Kingdom still can.

Social Protection Pays Off
Shahra Razavi (Project Syndicate) Mar 23, 2020
Governments must use the momentum created by the COVID-19 pandemic to make rapid progress toward collectively financed, comprehensive, and permanent social-protection systems. Only then will our societies and economies be able to weather the current crisis – and those to come.

This Time Truly Is Different
Carmen M. Reinhart (Project Syndicate) Mar 23, 2020
The vast uncertainty surrounding the possible spread of COVID-19 and the duration of the near-economic standstill required to combat it make forecasting little different from guessing. Clearly, this is a "whatever-it-takes" moment for large-scale, outside-the-box fiscal and monetary policies.

Beating COVID-19 and the Economic Pandemic
Shang-Jin Wei (Project Syndicate) Mar 23, 2020
The COVID-19 pandemic threatens the world with disaster. But the crisis also offers governments a rare chance to undertake policy changes that address the short-term public-health challenge and boost the global economy's long-term growth potential.

Insuring the Survival of Post-Pandemic Economies
Roman Frydman and Edmund S. Phelps (Project Syndicate) Mar 23, 2020
Alarmingly, a growing chorus in the US – including President Donald Trump – is assuming that new "stimulus" legislation will allow the COVID-19 lockdown to be eased as soon as Easter. In fact, the pandemic demands not only vast government spending but also intervention, including a temporary state-led reorganization of the entire economy.

Rapidly identifying workers who are immune to COVID-19 and virus-free is a priority for restarting the economy
Mathias Dewatripont, Michel Goldman, Eric Muraille, and Jean-Philippe Platteau (VoxEU) Mar 23, 2020
The first phase of the economic response to the COVID-19 pandemic is already under way with measures that, while costly, are relatively 'easy'. The second phase – restarting the economy – involves the more challenging task of overcoming people's fears of contracting the virus from a co-worker. This column describes how a combination of two currently available tests could identify people who are both free from COVID-19 and immune to it, and thus are safe to go back to work. A targeted scaling-up of procedures for both tests will help maintain vital services and accelerate the relaunch of the economy, while minimising the risk of the epidemic recurring after restrictions are lifted.

Saving China from the coronavirus and economic meltdown: Experiences and lessons
Yi Huang, Chen Lin, Pengfei Wang, and Zhiwei Xu (VoxEU) Mar 23, 2020
With the COVID-19 outbreak having officially become a pandemic, it is essential to consider not just how to prevent further public health crises but also economic and financial crises. This column suggests that in both cases, recent lessons from China are instructive. China enacted aggressive public health policies that appear to have been effective, at least in the short term. But the measures taken to stem the public health crisis may still lead to a domestic economic meltdown that could infect international trade.

Global value chains and trade protection
Chad Bown, Aksel Erbahar, and Maurizio Zanardi (VoxEU) Mar 23, 2020
The decades preceding the Trump era saw a significant decline in trade barriers and a concurrent rise in global value chains. Evidence on the direction of causality between the two is still lacking. Using an exogenously timed WTO requirement for countries to re-evaluate previously imposed tariffs, this column argues that increased activity through global value chains had an important role to play in the countries' choice to reduce trade protection during this period.

Coronavirus: Impact on stock prices and growth expectations
Niels Joachim Gormsen and Ralph Koijen (VoxEU) Mar 23, 2020
The economic effects of the coronavirus outbreak, and the preventive measures adopted around the world, are still largely unknown. In addition, standard macroeconomic models based on fundamentals may be slow to adapt in this fast-changing environment. This column uses high-frequency data on dividend futures to evaluate the impact on growth expectations. Dividend growth and GDP growth expectations in the US and EU begin to deteriorate after the lockdown in Italy, and these effects are exacerbated by the travel restrictions imposed thereafter. The lower bound on dividend growth is as severe as during the Global Crisis, at least in the short run.

Strengthening automatic stabilisers could help combat the next downturn
Aida Caldera, Alessandro Maravalle, Lukasz Rawdanowicz, and Ana Sanchez Chico (VoxEU) Mar 23, 2020
Global economic growth is expected to remain weak and significant downside risks persist. As room for conventional monetary policy is limited or exhausted, policymakers will need to rely increasingly on fiscal policy to stabilise the economy during the next economic downturn. This column presents new OECD estimates which suggest that automatic stabilisers on average offset 60% of a specific shock to market income across 23 OECD economies. However, there are marked differences across OECD countries leaving scope to make automatic stabilisers more effective.

The Fed Goes Nuclear
Jay H. Bryson (WF) Mar 23, 2020
The Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) announced a series of steps this morning designed to support the flow of credit in the U.S. economy. The actions taken are breath-taking in their scope. Indeed, these steps surpass in breadth and depth the measures that the Fed created in the midst of the financial crisis a decade ago.

The Fiscal Stimulus Bill: What Happens Next?
Michael Pugliese and Hop Mathews (WF) Mar 23, 2020
Last night, the U.S. Senate failed to clear a procedural hurdle that would have advanced the "Phase III" fiscal stimulus bill towards final passage. Today, the Senate tried again to clear the hurdle, and it once again failed.

Expected U.S. Macroeconomic Performance during the Pandemic Adjustment Period
James Bullard (FRBSL On the Economy) Mar 23, 2020
The coronavirus has the potential to create catastrophic health outcomes in the U.S. In order to mitigate this, public health officials have recommended a variety of social-distancing policies to slow the spread of the virus. In addition, social interaction has declined dramatically due to voluntary withdrawal by individuals, corporate work-from-home policies and government restrictions.

Fed Fails to Stem Market Bloodbath as Congress Stumbles on Aid Package
Various (FP) Mar 23, 2020
The coronavirus pandemic has undoubtedly changed the world. What will it look like afterward?

Fed Fails to Stem Market Bloodbath as Congress Stumbles on Aid Package
Keith Johnson and Michael Hirsh (FP) Mar 23, 2020
Out of options? Despite unprecedented measures by the U.S. Federal Reserve to slow the economic chaos caused by the coronavirus, global markets are still falling.

China's Debt Diplomacy Will Get a Coronavirus Boost
Azeem Ibrahim (FP) Mar 23, 2020
As countries struggle to meet their debts to China amid the global economic downturn, Beijing is likely to use the situation to its advantage.

America urgently needs a stronger stimulus
FT View Mar 24, 2020
Plan fails to boost rickety US health system and help the most vulnerable.

Industry can adapt to help fight coronavirus
FT View Mar 24, 2020
Pandemic gives companies a chance to demonstrate responsible capitalism.

Oil industry faces biggest crisis in 100 years
David Sheppard (FT) Mar 24, 2020
Producers are facing up to the crash in oil demand as coronavirus forces economies into hibernation.

The Fed has gone past the point of 'QE infinity'
Michael Mackenzie (FT) Mar 24, 2020
New measures extend a post-Lehman crisis legacy of distorted risk premia in markets.

Central banks must evolve
Philipp Hildebrand (FT) Mar 24, 2020
They need to make sure interest rates don't rise in an uncontrolled way.

Gulf economies rocked by coronavirus and oil price war
Simeon Kerr sand Andrew England (FT) Mar 24, 2020
Government revenues plummet as crude prices sink and private sector cuts jobs.

Private Industry Mobilizes Against the Coronavirus
WSJ Mar 24, 2020
The feds don't need to nationalize the economy to fight Covid-19

Flatten the Coronavirus Curve at a Lower Cost
John H. Cochrane (WSJ) Mar 24, 2020
A total shutdown could cost the economy $1 trillion a month. We need more tailored measures.

In World's Most Vulnerable Countries, the Pandemic Rivals the 2008 Crisis
Peter S. Goodman, Daniel Politi, Suhasini Raj, Lynset Chutel & Abdi Latif Dahir (NYT) Mar 24, 2020
As capital flees emerging markets, those countries are absorbing the most potent economic shocks of the coronavirus outbreak.

Are young people doomed to a repeat of the Great Recession?
Megan McArdle (WP) Mar 24, 2020
While this recession is also a revelation of sorts, it does not signal fundamental structural problems in the underlying economy.

Trump is missing the big picture on the economy
Lawrence Summers (WP) Mar 24, 2020
The right focus is not on false hopes.

One institution in Washington is working: The Fed
David Ignatius (WP) Mar 24, 2020
Chair Jerome Powell's message is that the Fed's support for U.S. business is unlimited.

How to stop the tsunami of surplus oil that's about to slam the global economy
Daniel Yergin and Roger Diwan (WP) Mar 24, 2020
A hammer blow could fall in the next two months if, as seems likely without immediate action, more surplus oil floods the marketplace.

The G-20 must wake up to the COVID-19 crisis
Edwin M. Truman (PIIE) Mar 24, 2020
As nations across the globe scramble to combat the coronavirus pandemic, they have overlooked a major tool that would help greatly: international coordination of their economic policy responses to the crisis. Concerted action within the Group of Seven (G-7) leading industrial democracies has been minuscule, and the larger Group of Twenty (G-20), which played a crucial role in rescuing the global economy in 2008–09, has been an afterthought.[1] This neglect finally may be changing.

China's economic recovery strategy faces challenges
Nicholas R. Lardy and Tianlei Huang (PIIE) Mar 24, 2020
China has broken the back of the coronavirus spread, and policy is shifting strongly to supporting economic growth. The challenge is huge, reflected in declines of 13.5 percent and 20.5 percent in industrial output and retail sales, respectively, in the first two months of 2020. And in February the unemployment rate jumped to 6.2 percent, an all-time high. These data points suggest that a sharp contraction in China's first quarter GDP is inevitable.

5 Principles on the Uses and Misuses of Debt Relief to Address the Coronavirus Pandemic
Scott Morris (CGD) Mar 24, 2020
Debt relief for low-income countries (LICs) is on the table of measures to consider for coronavirus response. But we should recognize that the current crisis is different from the past when it comes to a major, multi-country debt relief effort, and it's important to think through where debt relief makes sense and where it doesn't as a response to this pandemic. The imperative right now is to get cash to LICs as quickly as possible. Suspending some debt service payments may be a good first step in freeing up some budget space for new spending. Beyond that, protracted debt-relief negotiations with multilateral and commercial creditors right now could be a distraction at best but could also actively undermine the ability of institutions like the World Bank to offer new financing for crisis response. P>Banks in pandemic turmoil
Nicolas Véron (Bruegel) Mar 24, 2020
The banking system is critical to society and requires attention and support. In doing so, however, tough love is preferable to complacency.

In Europe the Crisis Policy Response Is Substantial, But More Is Likely Needed
Nicola Mai, Peder Beck-Friis, and Konstantin Veit (PIMCO) Mar 24, 2020
The conditions for a relatively quick and robust rebound rest on the success in containing the virus within a reasonable horizon, and a well-calibrated economic policy response.

The Fed: Avoiding a Depression
Tiffany Wilding (PIMCO) Mar 24, 2020
The Fed's aggressive support may help keep markets functioning, hasten recovery and avoid longer-term damage.

Coronavirus: A Trust Stresstest for Globalization
Valbona Zeneli and Joseph Vann (Globalist) Mar 24, 2020
It is not too early for policy makers to begin examining why globalization did not work out the way its advocates either wished or thought it would.

Offshoring Left the U.S. Unprepared for Coronavirus
Noah Smith (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 24, 2020
Supply chains created to boost profits led to production of masks and swabs overseas. Wonder why there's a shortage now?

How the Covid-19 Recession Is Like World War II
Tyler Cowen (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 24, 2020
In this war, a virus has attacked and a significant portion of the economy has been redirected.

We're Looking at a System-Wide Margin Call
Shuli Ren (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 24, 2020
The worst scramble for cash is happening in an opaque corner of the market that the Fed can't control.

The Dollar Squeeze Is Coming for China Inc.
Anjani Trivedi (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 24, 2020
After the coronavirus hit, markets are too jittery for the same old debt rollover.

Can Africa Withstand COVID-19?
Denis Chopera (Project Syndicate) Mar 24, 2020
From a young population to a warm climate, some factors put Africa on a stronger footing to cope with the COVID-19 outbreak. But on a continent beset by weak health systems and preexisting conditions like HIV and tuberculosis, the risks must not be underestimated.

The Arab World's Perfect COVID-19 Storm
Nasser Saidi (Project Syndicate) Mar 24, 2020
In the face of the COVID-19 pandemic, policymakers in the Gulf Cooperation Council states are rolling out stimulus measures to support businesses and the economy. But the camel in the room remains oil, especially the immediate impact on demand of the Chinese and global economic slowdown.

The Virus Turns South
Roberto Chang and Andres Velasco (Project Syndicate) Mar 24, 2020
Latin America is "lucky" to be a few weeks behind Europe and Asia in the global spread of the COVID-19 coronavirus. The region has never faced a crisis like this one, and policymakers must use this time wisely, which means acting swiftly and boldly.

The G20's Pandemic Moment
Jim O'Neill (Project Syndicate) Mar 24, 2020
Just as a meager investment to address antimicrobial resistance could yield a 2,000% return in the future, so, too, would an immediate modest outlay to finance development of COVID-19 therapeutics. As world leaders gather to formulate a response to the crisis, they must not lose sight of this simple cost-benefit calculus.

A Green Reboot After the Pandemic
Sandrine Dixson-Declève , Hunter Lovins, Hans Joachim Schellnhuber, and Kate Raworth (Project Syndicate) Mar 24, 2020
In addition to threatening millions of lives and the global economy, the COVID-19 pandemic has demonstrated that human societies are capable of transforming themselves more or less overnight. In fact, there's no better time than now to usher in systemic economic change.

A Greater Depression?
Nouriel Roubini (Project Syndicate) Mar 24, 2020
With the COVID-19 pandemic still spiraling out of control, the best economic outcome that anyone can hope for is a recession deeper than that following the 2008 financial crisis. But given the flailing policy response so far, the chances of a far worse outcome are increasing by the day.

Flattening the COVID-19 Curve in Developing Countries
Ricardo Hausmann (Project Syndicate) Mar 24, 2020
The more contained you want the novel coronavirus to be, the more you will need to lock down your country – and the more fiscal space you will require to mitigate the deeper recession that will result. The problem for most of the Global South is that policymakers lack fiscal space even in the best of times.

A proposal for a negative SME tax
Thomas Drechsel and Sebnem Kalemli-Ozcan (VoxEU) Mar 24, 2020
Strong policy interventions are required to support the economy during the COVID-19 pandemic. This column provides estimates on the costs and effects of a negative lump-sum tax for US SMEs based on firms' payrolls. A policy covering the payroll for all firms with fewer than 500 employees for three months could benefit 61 million workers in the US at a cost of 3% of GDP.

News and uncertainty about the economic fallout of COVID-19
Alexander Dietrich, Keith Kuester, Gernot Müller, and Raphael Schoenle (VoxEU) Mar 24, 2020
The effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on the global economy are still largely unknown. The short-term economic impact will depend importantly on people's expectations of the overall effect, and the amount of uncertainty thereof. This column uses a survey of US households to show that the expected economic effect is negative, large, and highly uncertain. An asset-pricing equation is used to quantify the implication of these expectations for the natural rate of interest. The natural rate declines by several percentage points, suggesting a role for monetary accommodation to (partially) offset the shock.

Covid Perpetual Eurobonds
Francesco Giavazzi and Guido Tabellini (VoxEU) Mar 24, 2020
This war-like shock will require very large fiscal support. Its financing cost should be distributed over several generations. This can be achieved by issuing irredeemable or very long maturity Eurobonds. They should be backed by the ECB to keep the financing burden low. This column argues that no institutional or legal constraints prevent this policy response. Prompt action is critical since allowing one crisis to morph into many could disrupt the European project, with far-reaching and unpredictable political implications.

European bank regulators aren't yet doing what it takes
Ignazio Angeloni (VoxEU) Mar 24, 2020
Banks are the key to providing financial oxygen to the economy, but the coronavirus pandemic is raising the risk that banks in the euro area will cease to function. This column argues that the return to normality we all crave requires, among other things, that banks be saved, and that this will not happen unless regulation is adapted and more public support is provided.

The COVID-19 crisis calls for pre-emptive monitoring of production and distribution chains
Group of concerned economists (VoxEU) Mar 24, 2020
With a significant fraction of workers sick or in quarantine, stay-at-home policies and the closing of borders, the risk of disruptions in supply chains has risen. In this column, a group of concerned economists advocate the establishment of a 'monitoring cabinet' to detect problems along the production and distribution chains of essential goods in real time, and inform populations about the availability of these goods in a credible and reassuring manner.

Two Impossible Global Challenges
Bernard Gilland (YaleGlobal) Mar 24, 2020
Fossil fuels have enabled great advances, yet the price is unsustainable population growth

Pandemic Panic: Can Governments Protect Jobs and Markets?
Mauro Guillen (K@W) Mar 24, 2020
Where the COVID-19 pandemic is headed seems unclear, but a recession is on the way. What governments can do about the unprecedented challenge of looming layoffs and crashing markets.

COVID-19: Countering the Economic Contagion
Manuel M. Dayrit and Ronald U. Mendoza (Diplomat) Mar 24, 2020
Preventive steps to prevent infection may produce an economic crisis that risks exacerbating poverty, hunger, and health issues.

U.N. Calls for Rolling Back Sanctions to Battle Pandemic
Colum Lynch (FP) Mar 24, 2020
Secretary-General Guterres says it's time for "solidarity not exclusion."

Is $2 Trillion Too Little, Too Late?
Michael Hirsh (FP) Mar 24, 2020
Despite market rebound, economists say only a major suspension of mortgage and debt contracts and reimbursement of pay may stave off a coronavirus depression.

Eurozone Economy Approaching the Growth Cliff
Nick Bennenbroek and Jen Licis (WF) Mar 24, 2020
Today's release of the Eurozone manufacturing and services PMIs in our view provides the clearest indication yet of the economic damage the Eurozone economy could suffer from the COVID-19 virus.

Non-bank lenders will bear brunt of credit crisis
FT View Mar 25, 2020
Financial risk has been pushed from banks into the shadows.

India's virus battle shows struggle of global south
FT View Mar 25, 2020
Developing states cannot rely on measures used in Europe and the US.

How durable is China's capitalist model?
Geoff Dyer (FT) Mar 25, 2020
The country's economic system has many flaws — yet critics underestimate it at their peril.

Treat all workers fairly to aid the Covid-19 battle
Christopher Pissarides (FT) Mar 25, 2020
People with insecure incomes have to make choices that undermine government measures.

The 'doom loop' in bond funds is a systemic risk
Peter Chatwell (FT) Mar 25, 2020
Some exchange traded funds are trading at big discounts to their net asset values.

Making a case for 'Corona bonds'
Justin Urquhart Stewart (FT) Mar 25, 2020
In previous times of crisis, private investors have financed war bonds, so why not now?

If Africa cannot beat Covid-19 it will haunt us all
Abiy Ahmed (FT) Mar 25, 2020
Only a global victory can end this pandemic, not a temporary rich countries' win.

A $2 Trillion Lifeline Will Help, but More May Be Needed
Jim Tankersley (NYT) Mar 25, 2020
The bill moving through Congress is more than twice as large as the stimulus package passed in 2009, but it will soothe a shutdown economy for only a few months.

How to Prevent a Coronavirus Depression
Neil Irwin (NYT) Mar 25, 2020
Think of the strategy as a three-legged stool: mutually reinforcing supports that can't really work in isolation.

The High Price of Coronavirus Relief
WSJ Mar 25, 2020
The Fed gets money to save the economy, but Pelosi's price is steep.

Coronavirus Stimulus Should Bar Stock Buybacks
William A. Galston (WSJ) Mar 25, 2020
Large corporations have piled on debt, making themselves vulnerable to shocks.

How to pay for the pandemic
Economist Mar 25, 2020
Covid-19 could usher in a new era of sovereign-debt management.

Canada: A Bigger Economic Hit, a Greater Capacity to Respond
Tiffany Wilding and Allison Boxer (PIMCO) Mar 25, 2020
Canada's economy may be at greater risk for lasting damage, but we believe Ottawa is well-positioned to respond.

EU limits on medical exports leave many poor countries vulnerable to COVID-19
Chad P. Bown (PIIE) Mar 25, 2020
The European Union's (EU's) export restrictions on certain medical products could leave healthcare systems in developing countries without protective equipment in the midst of the global coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.

Banks in the COVID-19 turmoil: Capital relief is welcome, supervisory forbearance is not
Nicolas Véron (PIIE) Mar 25, 2020
Economic disruptions due to the COVID-19 pandemic have compelled bankers on both sides of the Atlantic to call for relaxation of accounting standards that were introduced in the wake of the global financial crisis. These standards, known as expected credit loss provisioning, were intended to limit procyclicality, namely the exacerbation of shifts in asset prices as a result of the application of accounting and/or regulatory requirements. Policymakers and accounting standard-setters should refrain from changing the applicable standards in haste and should ignore the bankers' admonishments. There is no perfect accounting thermometer for credit risk in banks' loan books, but breaking the current thermometer in the midst of a crisis would do more harm than good.

What the G20 needs to deliver
Roland Rajah (Lowy Interpreter) Mar 25, 2020
A global pandemic demands a global "whatever it takes".

Covid-19 crisis: electricity demand as a real-time indicator
Ben McWilliams and Georg Zachmann (Bruegel) Mar 25, 2020
Comparing average weekday hourly electricity demand for the last few weeks to the year before, we visualise the moment when the current crisis began to have an impact on national economies and how large that impact was.

What a Population's Age Structure Means for COVID-19's Impact in Low-Income Countries
David Evans and Eric Werker (CGD) Mar 25, 2020
Countries across the world, including the very poorest, have begun to implement heavy-handed measures to slow the rate of transmission of COVID-19. Even before taking those measures, low-income countries with hardly any identified cases were already reporting sizeable economic impacts. Travel and tourism have ground to a halt, producers can't get materials, and retailers can't get products. Global growth estimates are down, along with growth estimates for Africa, Latin America, and elsewhere. One estimate suggests that a 1 percent lower growth in the global economy would translate to between 14 million and 22 million more people living in extreme poverty.

In It Together: Protecting the Health of Africa's People and their Economies
Karen Ongley and Abebe Aemro Selassie (IMF) Mar 25, 2020
The growing presence of COVID 19 in sub-Saharan Africa threatens the same human costs as elsewhere in the world. The economic costs could be just as devastating.

Getting COVID-19 financial relief to millions of Americans in need requires a multichannel strategy
Donald Hammond and David Wilcox (PIIE) Mar 25, 2020
The US Senate has come to agreement on a giant coronavirus (COVID-19) rescue package, and final Congressional approval could come very rapidly. One key element of the bill is cash payments to American households. Checks of $1,200 for adults and $500 for children will be sent to well more than 100 million Americans, providing palliative relief to some recipients.

Four Things You Need to Know Now About the Economy and Markets
Mohamed A. El-Erian (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 25, 2020
Emergency monetary and fiscal measures have acted as circuit breakers for now, but policy makers and investors need to stay vigilant.

The Dollar Crunch Is Europe's Gift to Asia
Nisha Gopalan and Andy Mukherjee (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 25, 2020
The last crisis shook up banking in the region. So could this one.

Spain Sells $11 Billion of Debt, No Problem at All
Marcus Ashworth (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 25, 2020
Government and corporate bond issuers are having to pay slightly more interest on new issues, but the debt market is functioning.

The Coronavirus Trade-Off That Won't Go Away
Clive Crook (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 25, 2020
Whether we like it or not, the choice between lives and the economy is already dictating events.

Africa's Race Against COVID-19
Kevin Watkins (Project Syndicate) Mar 25, 2020
With governments in Europe and the US fighting desperate national battles of their own against COVID-19, the continent may seem a remote concern. But if there is one thing the pandemic has taught us, it is that we are all connected in a world of shared risks.

A Coordinated Response to COVID-19
Lee Jong-Wha (Project Syndicate) Mar 25, 2020
Short of a vaccine, international cooperation is our best weapon against a deadly virus like COVID-19 – and our best defense against global economic collapse. As in the wake of the 2008 global financial crisis, the G20 should take the lead.

Leadership in a Time of Contagion
Mark Leonard (Project Syndicate) Mar 25, 2020
Although the COVID-19 pandemic has been compared to the 2008 financial crisis, the two episodes are quite different, not least in their cast of leading characters. Unlike the previous generation, today's European leaders have been shaped by a decade of austerity, refugee crises, and America's denouement as a global hegemon.

Will the US Pandemic Response Strengthen Workers?
Teresa Ghilarducci (Project Syndicate) Mar 25, 2020
In a rare moment of bipartisanship, congressional Republicans and Democrats have found plenty of common ground in designing an economic-policy response to the coronavirus pandemic. But unless that response re-balances the economy toward labor, the recovery will inevitably prove disappointing.

A Pandemic Is No Time for US Economic Sanctions
Jeffrey D. Sachs and Francisco Rodríguez (Project Syndicate) Mar 25, 2020
During the current COVID-19 crisis, containment efforts must be global, and at-risk countries must be able to count on all necessary international assistance. Sanctions by the government of the world's largest economy make this impossible.

Production Networks and Firm Value: Evidence from the US-China Trade War
Yi Huang, Chen Lin, Sibo Liu, and Heiwai Tang (VoxChina) Mar 25, 2020
This paper discusses the effects on the financial markets of the several rounds of tariff hikes during the 2018–19 US-China trade war. It illustrates that US firms that are more dependent on exports to and imports from China have lower stock prices around the announcement date, while the expectation of weakened Chinese import competition due to US tariffs plays an economically minimal role. Firms with indirect exposure to US-China trade through domestic supply chains also experience more negative stock returns, with the magnitude of the effects sometimes even greater than the direct trade exposure. The differential responses are not due to firms' short-term overreactions, and are observed two months after the initial announcement in March 2018.

A memo to trade ministers on how trade policy can help fight COVID-19
Anabel González (VoxEU) Mar 25, 2020
As countries deploy all instruments to combat the COVID-19 pandemic, this column reminds trade ministers around the world that trade can serve as a powerful, low-cost tool to improve access to medical supplies. It offers various recommendations for immediate action, all of them compatible with WTO rules.

Coronavirus and financial stability 2.0: Act jointly now, but also think about tomorrow
Arnoud Boot, Elena Carletti, Hans-Helmut Kotz, Jan Pieter Krahnen, Loriana Pelizzon, and Marti Subrahmanyam (VoxEU) Mar 25, 2020
The COVID-19 pandemic has massive detrimental economic effects and demands immediate policy actions to prevent a financial or debt crisis. This column argues that while the fiscal policy responses in Europe have some merit in the short term, they put financial stability in the longer run at risk. It calls for a coordinated long-term fiscal plan at the pan-European level to complement national measures.

The ESM must help against the pandemic: The case of Spain
Aitor Erce, Antonio Garcia Pascual, and Toni Roldán Monés (VoxEU) Mar 25, 2020
The amount of financial resources needed to fight the COVID-19 is so large that most euro area member states will need a backstop from Europe. This column discusses how to use the European Stability Mechanism toolbox to finance the fight, using Spain as an example. It shows that an ESM loan with low margins and a smoothed repayment schedule would stabilise debt stocks and gross financing needs, and that ESM financing could help Spain save around €150 billion in interest payments between 2020 and 2030. A combination of bold ESM and ECB support could reinforce Spain's debt sustainability after the COVID-19 shock, and could do the same for other member states.

COVID-19: A euro area safe asset and fiscal capacity are needed now
Lorenzo Codogno, and Paul van den Noord (VoxEU) Mar 25, 2020
The COVID-19 outbreak that is hitting the euro area economy needs to be met by a powerful policy response beyond the emergency measures already in place. This column uses an empirically calibrated model to show that the creation of a safe asset and fiscal capacity at the centre – on which the debate has been ongoing for a long while – would be a powerful means to mitigate the economic impact of the crisis.

Transition steps to stop COVID-19 without killing the world economy
Andrea Ichino, Giacomo Calzolari, Andrea Mattozzi, Aldo Rustichini, Giulio Zanella, and Massimo Anelli (VoxEU) Mar 25, 2020
The world economy cannot survive the current social distancing for more than a few weeks. This column proposes a viable strategy to address the joint health and economic crisis caused by COVID-19, which involves gradually sending the young who face the lowest risks back to work on a voluntary basis. This should happen as soon as the congestion of healthcare systems is less critical, but while a large fraction of the population is not yet immune. All of these workers in centrally relevant sectors must be temporarily separated from the old and the immunocompromised. They must also be frequently tested for COVID-19 and for subsequent immunity as well as monitored to immediately trace the contagion they may induce or receive.

Forecast Update: A Much Deeper Contraction
Jay H. Bryson (WF) Mar 25, 2020
The rapidly evolving COVID-19 outbreak and the steps that authorities around the world have taken to combat it have caused us to rethink the forecast that we released only last week. We now look for the U.S. economy to contract more than 5% (not annualized) over the next two quarters, making it the deepest peak-to-trough decline in real GDP in the post-World War II era.

COVID-19 Creating a Risk for EM Corporates
Brendan McKenna, Erik Nelson, and Nick Bennenbroek (WF) Mar 25, 2020
As the COVID-19 virus intensifies, demand for the U.S. dollar has increased significantly. Safe haven flows have contributed to the greenback strength, but a lack of dollar liquidity has also pushed the dollar higher against all G10 currencies, while emerging currencies have come under the most pressure.

Social Distance Dating Advice
Tim Quinlan, Sarah House, and Shannon Seery (WF) Mar 25, 2020
The U.S. economy is headed for imminent recession even if the four indicators used by the dating committee at the National Bureau of Economic Research do not yet show it. Dating the economic cycle is not easy. Now that recession is likely underway, here is our best advice on what to watch on the way down and when we may expect to find a bottom.

How Asia has fought the economic fallout of coronavirus
FT Mar 26, 2020
Policies to preserve jobs, businesses and financial sector liquidity are most effective

Eurozone leaders should use their existing tools
FT View Mar 26, 2020
"Coronabonds" are a good idea but the bloc can tap its existing rescue fund.

Coronavirus threatens Indian banks' nascent recovery
Benjamin Parkin (FT) Mar 26, 2020
Work to reduce bad corporate loans at risk of setback as fears grow for consumers.

We face a war and must mobilise
Mario Draghi (FT) Mar 26, 2020
Higher public debt levels will become an economic feature and be accompanied by private debt cancellation.

What makes this global dollar crunch different?
Wenxin Du (FT) Mar 26, 2020
The growth of the non-banks has made the problem even more difficult for central banks to solve this time around.

From coronavirus crisis to sovereign debt crisis
Lee Buchheit and Sean Hagan (FT) Mar 26, 2020
It's not just individuals who are in urgent need of debt moratoriums during the coronavirus. Some sovereign countries will need them too.

The Coronavirus Euro
WSJ Mar 26, 2020
Be wary of overhauling the currency bloc to fight the virus.

The Coronavirus Debt Threat
Carmen M. Reinhart and Kenneth Rogoff (WSJ) Mar 26, 2020
Developing nations as well as advanced ones will soon face a health emergency and its economic consequences.

US tells Saudi crown prince to end oil price war
Alison Tahmizian Meuse (AT) Mar 26, 2020
The Covid-19 pandemic has seen global lockdowns and plummeting energy demands.

If you thought the trade war was bad for global commerce...
Economist Mar 26, 2020
The disruption from the pandemic will be much worse.

COVID-19 Fiscal response: What are the options for the EU Council?
Grégory Claeys and Guntram B. Wolff (Bruegel) Mar 26, 2020
It is time for the EU Council to make quick progress on the fiscal front and announce something as soon as possible to show that it taken full measure of the severity of the situation.

From G7 to G20: passing three hot potatoes
Alicia García-Herrero (Bruegel) Mar 26, 2020
Yesterday's G7 video-conference ended in silence. It wasn't even possible for the group to issue a joint statement after the US administration's push to enter into a blame game over the Covid-19 label. However, let's not give up. There is one more chance today for global coordination: the G20 emergency video-conference hosted by Saudi Arabia. This is the opportunity for the G20 to stand out and overshadow the G7 and for the world to end up with some international policy coordination. The key issues continue to be dollar liquidity, excessive dollar appreciation and plummeting oil prices.

After its COVID-19 emergency, Europe should issue joint recovery bonds
Jacob Funk Kirkegaard (PIIE) Mar 26, 2020
As exceptional as efforts by the European Central Bank (ECB) and European states have been at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, it is not too soon to think beyond the crisis. The ECB has waived its self-imposed restriction on the amount of bonds it can buy from each member state in its Pandemic Emergency Purchase Program (PEPP), signaling that it has the eurozone's back for the duration of the emergency. European leaders must now ensure that the same solidarity is adopted for the long-term economic recovery. Europe's symmetric crisis must not turn into an(other) asymmetric recovery.

COVID-19: China's exports of medical supplies provide a ray of hope
Chad P. Bown (PIIE) Mar 26, 2020
Partially abetted by the Trump administration's demonization of China over the COVID-19 pandemic, there has been widespread fear that vital exports of Chinese personal protective equipment supplies to the United States would disappear. The European Union worried that China's outbreak might lead to supply disruptions. Newly released Chinese customs data indicate, however, that there was a drop but not as precipitous as feared. Chinese exports of essential hospital supplies did decline in the first two months of 2020, as expected, but only by 15 percent. And the factors behind the dip were complex, and not simply a case of China hoarding the equipment for itself or retaliating against the Trump trade war.

Singapore's 10% Hit Is Pretty Standard for a Crisis
Daniel Moss (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 26, 2020
While growth is contracting, these levels aren't unprecedented. The city-state will recover eventually, along with the rest of the world.

What More Could the Fed Possibly Do? A Lot
Tim Duy (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 26, 2020
It's fashionable to say the central bank has "run out of ammunition," but that's far from true.

Globalization Is the Best Medicine for a Sick Planet
Kori Schake (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 26, 2020
Even a vague promise of international cooperation is better — and more in the U.S. interest — than the Trump administration's actions.

The Helicopters Are Coming
Willem H. Buiter (Project Syndicate) Mar 26, 2020
With the economic situation in many advanced economies rapidly deteriorating, policymakers are rolling out unprecedented stimulus programs, setting the stage for what amounts to a massive experiment with hitherto unorthodox Modern Monetary Theory. Today's extraordinary problems, it would seem, require extraordinary solutions.

China's Misplaced Pandemic Propaganda
Minxin Pei (Project Syndicate) Mar 26, 2020
As the COVID-19 pandemic escalates, China has shifted its propaganda machine into high gear, in an effort to change the narrative about the virus's origins and the Chinese response. But when this crisis is finally over, people will remember what China's leaders did, not what they said.

Toward a Coherent Economic Strategy for COVID-19
John B. Taylor (Project Syndicate) Mar 26, 2020
Although the COVID-19 crisis has been widely compared to the 2008 market collapse, a better analogy is the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. After that tragedy, the US government identified the root cause of the economic fallout and devised an effective strategy to address it.

The Race Between Economics and COVID-19
Mohamed A. El-Erian (Project Syndicate) Mar 26, 2020
For years, the economics profession has suffered from a stubborn reluctance to adopt a more multidisciplinary approach. But now that the COVID-19 pandemic is transforming economic life the world over, the profession has no choice but to leave its comfort zone.

Fault lines in fiscal-monetary policy coordination
Lucrezia Reichlin and Dirk Schoenmaker (VoxEU) Mar 26, 2020
Fiscal and monetary policy coordination is not working in the euro area. This column argues that in order to rebalance the weight of both during major crises, the asymmetry between decision making at the ECB (by majority voting) and the ESM (by unanimity or qualified majority) must be harmonised. This is urgent since the ESM is the only instrument available to provide the common fiscal capacity needed to fight the COVID-19 pandemic.

Testing for testing times
Richard Baldwin (VoxEU) Mar 26, 2020
The economic and medical fight against COVID-19 are linked, as Mathias Dewatripont and a team of virologist pointed out on VoxEU recently. The linchpin is testing. This column argues that testing is critical to (1) reducing the economic pain of the current COVID-19 wave, and (2) reducing the pain of the second wave that some epidemiologists are expecting. The US and Europe should be investing massively in testing capacity.

The political economy of COVID-motivated helicopter drops
Eran Yashiv (VoxEU) Mar 26, 2020
The use of helicopter money has been proposed to help combat the economic repercussions of the COVID-19 pandemic. The policy has been seen as blasphemy until now, and this column presents a political economy plan to break the taboo. The creation of emergency authority for central banks and the formation of a COVID policy committee could help establish the policy as a one-off, emergency money-financed plan, giving the central bank the authority to act quickly and then revert to the 'no money-printing' norm as the crisis subsides.

The coronavirus crisis is no 2008
Jon Danielsson, Robert Macrae, Dimitri Vayanos, and Jean-Pierre Zigrand (VoxEU) Mar 26, 2020
Many comparisons have been made between the coronavirus crisis and the global systemic crisis in 2008. This column argues that seen through the lens of exogenous and endogenous risk, these two crises are quite different. Coronavirus is unlikely to cause a global systemic crisis, and the policy response should be different.

Capital investment versus labour productivity
Michal Gradzewicz (VoxEU) Mar 26, 2020
Capital investment at firm level can have both short-run and long-run effects on labour productivity. This column uses evidence from Poland to explore the relationship further. It is clear that different types and sizes of firms, from various sectors, demonstrate a range of trends. What is notable is that the impact of 'learning by doing' runs deep and affects the initial decision process of the capital investment itself.

Economic Impacts of COVID-19
David Dapice (YaleGlobal) Mar 26, 2020
The disease forces hospitals, governments and businesses to triage.

The Coronavirus War Economy Will Change the World
Nicholas Mulder (FP) Mar 26, 2020
When societies shift their economies to a war footing, it doesn't just help them survive a crisis—it alters them forever.

Congress Unleashes the Fiscal Firehose
Michael Pugliese and Hop Mathews (WF) Mar 26, 2020
Last night, the U.S. Senate passed a landmark fiscal bill designed to keep the U.S. economy afloat amid the drastic measures taken to combat COVID-19.

Why the Fed should put the Treasuries market on a war footing
Colby Smith (FT) Mar 27, 2020
Analysts say it is time to revive the yield curve control policy after more than 70 years.

What central banks giveth they taketh away with margin calls
Daniela Gabor (FT) Mar 27, 2020
Central banks are supposed to offer counter-cyclical support in times of crisis. When it comes to dollar swap facilities, central banks' obsession with market discipline undermines that support.

Investors should brace for another market dive
Michael Mackenzie (FT) Mar 27, 2020
The equity rally reflects too much faith that policymakers can offset coronavirus effects.

Five Principles for the Pandemic
Martín Guzmán (Project Syndicate) Mar 27, 2020
As a global crisis, the COVID-19 pandemic demands a coordinated global response, both to contain the spread of the disease and to safeguard the economy. The challenge may be unprecedented, but governments can and should embrace certain guidelines.

How Epidemics Change Civilizations
Jason Willick (WSJ) Mar 27, 2020
Measures developed for the plagues of the 14th century are helping authorities fight the coronavirus now says Yale historian Frank Snowden

Rich nations must help coronavirus disaster zones. It's crucial to ending the pandemic.
WP Mar 27, 2020
An uncontrolled outbreak in these areas will propel new waves of desperate refugees northward.

Why the G in ESG matters in times of crisis
Silvia Pavoni (Banker) Mar 27, 2020
The coronavirus pandemic calls for brave leadership and good governance. This includes banks and other private sector entities supporting citizens and communities economically to survive and recover.

Awakening in the post-pandemic world
Dennis Snower (Brookings) Mar 27, 2020
Governments around the world are in crisis mode, "waging war" against the coronavirus on two fronts: containing the spread of the pandemic through social distancing and mitigating the resulting economic fallout. Once the crisis is over, we will hopefully awaken into a new world, one where we can learn the far-reaching, long-term lessons. One where we can see the dangers that we should have recognized a long time ago. One where we can understand the implications of these dangers for the future of government policy.

New US fiscal action should avert closures but not a recession
Joseph E. Gagnon (PIIE) Mar 27, 2020
The sweeping $2 trillion package of COVID-19 rescue measures nearing Congressional approval will not prevent a sharp recession in the next few months. But it will replace a large share of income lost by laid off workers and should enable many businesses to avoid permanent closures. Avoiding bankruptcy and liquidation is critical to enabling a rapid economic recovery as soon as health officials deem it safe to return to work.

Yes, medical gear depends on global supply chains. Here's how to keep them moving.
Anabel González (PIIE) Mar 27, 2020
The shortage of gloves, gowns, face masks, and other personal protective medical gear to fight the COVID-19 pandemic illustrates what everyone should know: The United States depends on global (and hemispheric) supply chains. Take the plans of HanesBrands to shift production from T-shirts and underwear to cotton masks in factories in El Salvador, the Dominican Republic, and Honduras. This production, under US federal contract, is expected to deliver 5 million or more protective masks weekly.

Europe needs a Covid-19 Recovery Programme
Grégory Claeys, Simone Tagliapietra and Guntram B. Wolff (Bruegel) Mar 27, 2020
Policymakers need to think long-term and start planning a broad investment scheme to reboot the European economy.

Pandemic Shutdowns Work for the Economy, Too
Scott Duke Kominers (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 27, 2020
Cities that clamped down early and longer in the Spanish flu outbreak had faster growth once the danger passed.

Junk Bonds Need a Little Love Too
Marcus Ashworth (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 27, 2020
Non-investment grade companies don't get protection from the ECB, but they employ people too and will be crucial to Europe's recovery.

Coronavirus Sorts Bond Market Into Winners and Losers
Brian Chappatta (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 27, 2020
The Fed's efforts have restored calm in some areas, but risky credit remains vulnerable.

The Fed's Cure Risks Being Worse Than the Disease
Jim Bianco (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 27, 2020
An alphabet soup of new asset-buying programs will essentially nationalize large swaths of the financial markets, and the consequences could be profound.

Surviving the Airline Wipeout Isn't About Balance Sheets
David Fickling (Bloomberg View) Mar 27, 2020
In a crisis, what matters are connections to governments and wealthy patrons.

Even China's Big Oil Is Cutting Back
Clara Ferreira Marques (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 27, 2020
Given Beijing's concern for energy security, it's a welcome hint of frugality by PetroChina and peers.

The COVID-19 Weakest Links
Yik-Ying Teo (Project Syndicate) Mar 27, 2020
Just as a chain is only as strong as its weakest link, so the failure of a single country to contain COVID-19 heightens the global risk. Countries with stronger health systems must now urgently assist their weaker counterparts, which in turn should readily accept any aid that helps them tackle this deadly global threat.

Economic Policies to Combat COVID-19 in Africa
Célestin Monga (Project Syndicate) Mar 27, 2020
The COVID-19 pandemic is likely to impose heavy human, financial, economic, and social costs on Africa. But the crisis also creates an opportunity to re-examine the continent's fiscal and economic-policy priorities, build stronger health and social sectors, and establish a global fund to support productive investment.

How Africa's Economies Can Hedge Against COVID-19
Ibrahim Assane Mayaki (Project Syndicate) Mar 27, 2020
The African Continental Free Trade Area will help dismantle tariff and non-tariff barriers amid a pandemic and global recession. Accelerating Africa's economic integration will cushion its fragile economies and help turn the continent into the world's largest common market.

Waging War on COVID-19
Andrew Sheng and Xiao Geng (Project Syndicate) Mar 27, 2020
Like any war, the fight against COVID-19 will disproportionately hurt those who were already vulnerable. Unless countries can move past destructive nationalism and petty competition in order to engage in constructive cooperation, millions will suffer, both physically and economically.

Foreseeable Unforeseeables
Jeffrey Frankel (Project Syndicate) Mar 27, 2020
Contrary to what US President Donald Trump would like to believe, a pandemic like COVID-19 was predicted as recently as last year. After being caught off guard by yet another catastrophe, one wonders when political leaders, markets, and average citizens will start to take risk seriously.

Future imperfect after coronavirus
Charles Goodhart and Manoj Pradhan (VoxEU) Mar 27, 2020
The authorities, like most of the rest of us, have been caught short by the sudden advent of the coronavirus pandemic, and are rightly rushing to limit unnecessary deaths. But in doing so, they are imposing a massive supply shock. This column asks what will happen when the lockdown gets lifted and recovery ensues, following this period of massive fiscal and monetary expansion. It argues that we will see a surge in inflation that can only be tackled once indebtedness has been restored to viable levels.

Viral Inequality
Ian Goldin and Robert Muggah (Project Syndicate) Mar 27, 2020
Far from merely reflecting an unequal distribution of economic means, rising inequality comes with a broad range of additional toxic side effects, many of which the COVID-19 pandemic has thrown into sharp relief. With the pandemic transforming life around the world before our eyes, this is a problem that can no longer be ignored.

Can microfinance unlock the poverty trap for some entrepreneurs?
Abhijit Banerjee, Emily Breza, Esther Duflo, and Cynthia Kinnan (VoxDev) Mar 27, 2020
Microfinance has potentially transformative impacts for some entrepreneurs, especially those who otherwise would be stuck in a poverty trap

The coronavirus shock to financial stability
Enrico Perotti (VoxEU) Mar 27, 2020
Years of quantitative easing by the ECB have suppressed sovereign yields to historic lows. This has contributed to a shadow banking boom, as market participants invested heavily in various private asset constructions. This column argues that the coronavirus shock poses a serious liquidity risk for the shadow banking sector, where significant funding has been extended on the basis of cash flow rather than real collateral. Avoiding financial panic is key, and will require liquidity support as well as targeted fiscal measures.

A user guide to COVID-19
Andrea Galeotti and Paolo Surico (VoxEU) Mar 27, 2020
The fight against COVID-19 is lacking two important weapons: full awareness of populations (especially carriers) and knowledge of the individual traits that are most likely to identify a carrier. This column introduces a 'user guide to COVID-19' – a package of resources which offer a narrative of events and present the trade-offs inherent in any policy option. It also appeals for more data collection and statistical analyses.

Housing markets in a time of crisis: A historical perspective
Price Fishback, Jonathan Rose, and Ken Snowden (FRB Chicago Fed Letter) Mar 27, 2020
As the coronavirus (Covid-19) public health crisis unfolds, a second crisis in the economy is developing as well. One economic concern, among many, is the debt burden of households. Early reports point to a surge in unemployment claims during March 2020, raising the prospect that widespread unemployment is likely to impair the ability of households to make payments on their home mortgages and other loans in the months ahead. This represents a potential crisis in mortgage markets, as borrowers who are temporarily unemployed—but for an unknown period—may face default on their mortgages.

Canada Fighting Economic War on Multiple Fronts
Jen Licis and Nick Bennenbroek (WF) Mar 27, 2020
The Canadian economy is facing a challenging economic environment as it has been hit with a one-two punch from the outbreak of the coronavirus and the plunge in oil prices. The ongoing oil price war between Saudi Arabia and Russia exacerbated an already existing over supply of oil, pushing Western Canadian oil prices to their lowest level on record. Meanwhile the economic effects of the coronavirus pandemic have created another shock to the Canadian economy.

Coronavirus must not destroy an open world economy
FT View Mar 28, 2020
The global health emergency makes trade more important, not less.

We Can Safely Restart the Economy in June. Here's How.
Ezekiel J. Emanuel (NYT) Mar 28, 2020
Get tough now. Test widely to isolate those infected, and slowly revive businesses with workers and customers who have developed immunity.

Don't Read Too Much Into Stocks' Sudden Rebound
Mohamed A. El-Erian (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 28, 2020
Investors should maintain caution instead of rushing back into risk.

Our Finest Hour
Javier Solana (Project Syndicate) Mar 28, 2020
Over the coming weeks, much will be at stake collectively, and for some of us also individually. Today, uncertainty about what the post-pandemic world will look like is rife, but we do know it will be built upon the words and deeds we choose now.

Managing economic lockdowns in an epidemic
Emanuel Ornelas (VoxEU) Mar 28, 2020
Countries worldwide are implementing lockdown measures to contain the COVID-19 pandemic. Very soon, the question will be how to lift the lockdowns while keeping the epidemic in check. This column uses basic economic principles to shed light on the key trade-offs. A central message is that there is no 'health versus economics' dichotomy. Rather, some degree of lockdown is typically optimal in a crisis like this, balancing economic costs against health benefits. Moreover, the optimal level of lockdown is dynamic, changing over time and eventually becoming more lenient.

Experience of banking crises reduces trust in banks
Zuzana Fungácová, Eeva Kerola, and Laurent Weill (VoxEU) Mar 28, 2020
Trust in banks is a core determinant of financial system effectiveness. While it is well-established that trust in banks fell sharply following the Global Crisis and affected individual decision-making and risk preferences, the longer-term impact of banking crises on trust in banks has not yet been explored. This column looks at the effect of experiencing a banking crisis on people's long-term confidence in banks. It shows that living through a banking crisis diminishes trust in banks, especially for more mature individuals, and that the loss of trust is long-lasting.

COVID-19: The economic policy response
Ethan Ilzetzki (VoxEU) Mar 28, 2020
The economic damage from the COVID-19 pandemic is already tangible. In response, fiscal and monetary policies have been introduced by many major economies. This column discusses results from a latest Centre for Macroeconomics survey on the policies best suited for dealing with the economic crisis in the UK. Broad consensus exists on the need to support households and businesses, through unemployment benefits, credit support, and direct transfers. Likewise, a substantial share of economists agree that higher public debt burdens should not be a concern in the process of supporting the economy.

Cross-country correlation analysis for research on COVID-19
Marianna Belloc, Paolo Buonanno, Francesco Drago, Roberto Galbiati, and Paolo Pinotti (VoxEU) Mar 28, 2020
Italy has been hit particularly badly by the COVID-19 pandemic and has one of the highest case fatality rates. High levels of intergenerational interaction in the country have been identified as a potential contributor to this. This column cautions against drawing policy implications from simple cross-country correlation analysis. It argues instead that sound empirical analysis using detailed and harmonised microdata at the European level should be conducted to analyse the effectiveness of policy interventions.

Corona bonds – great idea but complicated in reality
Lorenzo Bini Smaghi (VoxEU) Mar 28, 2020
Since the outbreak of COVID-19 in Europe, calls have been made by academics, politicians and observers to adopt Eurobonds to finance the actions needed to support economic activity. This column argues that the proposal poses two important political challenges. The first is to promote a broad transfer of economic and social competences from the national to the European level. The second is to reform the European Stability Mechanism and ensure that a sufficient number of countries apply so as to avoid stigma.

The Most Effective Stimulus Is Doing Whatever It Takes to Control the Coronavirus
John Cassidy (New Yorker) Mar 28, 2020
A drop in the rate of new infections would restore the spirits of consumers, business owners, and investors alike, and at least raise the possibility that economic activity could be resumed in the near future.

Virus puts responsible capitalism to the test
FT View Mar 29, 2020
State support demands business plays its part as a corporate citizen.

China and the US must fight Covid-19 together
Minxin Pei (FT) Mar 29, 2020
The gains from co-operation far outweigh the modest cost of the steps they could take.

Go-it-alone 'coronabonds' are worth the risk
Wolfgang Münchau (FT) Mar 29, 2020
Nine countries can make a stand for sharing the fiscal burden of the pandemic.

Can the world afford stimulus on this scale?
Gavyn Davies (FT) Mar 29, 2020
Policy injection is more dramatic than what we saw after financial crash.

Pump rescue funds down the last mile
Agustín Carstens (FT) Mar 29, 2020
Central bank liquidity has to reach affected individuals and companies urgently.

Oil Prices Crash, Virus Hits, Commerce Stops: Iraq Is in Trouble.
Alissa J. Rubin (NYT) Mar 29, 2020
Iraq depends on oil revenues, which have plummeted. The country is so desperate it is asking for donations to help it weather the pandemic.

Trump Said He Was the President of Manufacturing. Then Disaster Struck.
David E. Sanger and Maggie Haberman (NYT) Mar 29, 2020
For a leader who has embraced the language of a wartime president, it is as if the Pentagon asked for missiles and bombers but wouldn't say how many or where they should be delivered.

What the G-20 Can Do About Coronavirus
Charles Ries (WSJ) Mar 29, 2020
Lift trade restrictions on medical supplies and equipment, prepare for a vaccine, and update the antiquated system of certifying travelers' immunity.

We need pandemic bonds
Hugh Hewitt (WP) Mar 29, 2020
Buying bonds would let Americans be part of the fight. Funds raised could help build capacity for future crises: hospitals, stockpiles of medical equipment and more.

The IMF will need more resources to fight the COVID-19 pandemic
Edwin M. Truman (PIIE) Mar 29, 2020
The coronavirus pandemic is threatening to deliver its most lethal blows to the emerging market and developing economies, which are getting hit by large foreign financial outflows as well as health crises. Kristalina Georgieva, managing director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), has pledged to mobilize its $1 trillion lending capacity to assist members if necessary. But in truth, the Fund's capacity for new lending at maximum is $787 billion (table 1). The United States and other members will have to augment IMF resources for it to play a central role in this crisis. Curiously, the G-20 leaders' summit statement on COVID-19 issued on March 26 failed to recognize this issue.

Australia in a post-COVID-19 world
Allan Gyngell (EAF) Mar 29, 2020
COVID-19 has done more to close borders, reverse globalisation, decouple supply chains and marginalise multilateral institutions than the most fervent efforts of the world's populist nationalists.

Welcome to a Truly Free Oil Market
Julian Lee (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 29, 2020
As oil floods the market just when the world needs it least, only producers with deep pockets or storage tanks will be able to keep pumping.

Congress and the Fed Are Saving Lives
Bill Dudley (Bloomberg View) Mar 29, 2020
By containing the economic damage, they're making it easier to curb the pandemic.

Black Death Makes Us Think About Interest Rates
Andy Mukherjee (Bloomberg Opinion) Mar 29, 2020
The coronavirus could transform economic life for much longer than we expect.

COVID-19 crisis: Fiscal policy should lead and the Bank of England should follow
Richard Barwell, Jagjit Chadha, and Michael Grady (VoxEU) Mar 29, 2020
Doing 'whatever it takes' does not mean the Bank of England has to undermine long-run monetary and financial stability. This column outlines the options faced by the Bank of England in supporting the economy during the COVID-19 Crisis including closer coordination with fiscal policy.

Safeguarding governments' financial health during coronavirus
Richard Hughes (VoxEU) Mar 29, 2020
The coronavirus outbreak requires action from governments around the world. This includes policies to protect the health of citizens and to support the economy, all while safeguarding governments' financial stability. This column draws on experiences from past viral outbreaks to outline ten lessons for calibrating the correct policy response. Funding for health care systems should be prioritised, and targeted support for households and businesses is crucial. The rising costs and decreasing revenues for governments will also be challenging, and will likely require assistance from central banks as well as international and regional institutions.

COVID-19: Preventing a corporate cash crunch among listed firms
Antonio De Vito and Juan-Pedro Gomez (VoxEU) Mar 29, 2020
The coronavirus pandemic has endangered the liquidity position of not only SME firms, but also large listed firms. This column uses firm-level data from 26 countries to study how long it may take for these listed firms to become cash constrained, and what kind of interventions would be most effective. It concludes that while bridge loans would cost governments almost twice as much as a six-month tax deferral, the policy seems justified given the higher efficacy in preventing a global cash crunch.

China should stand up to revive global demand
FT View Mar 30, 2020
Beijing could show leadership by running current account deficits.

Saudi-Russia oil war is a game theory masterstroke
Antoine Halff (FT) Mar 30, 2020
The sell-off has hit high-cost producers while US shale can no longer be a free-rider.

Four ways that coronavirus has changed capital markets
Jim McCormick (FT) Mar 30, 2020
Government spending pledges should mean higher yields and more inflation.

Does coronavirus herald capital controls?
David Lubin (FT) Mar 30, 2020
Policymakers in emerging markets may have no choice but to restrict capital movement.

Japan: how coronavirus crushed Abe's Olympics dream
Leo Lewis and Murad Ahmed (FT) Mar 30, 2020
Tokyo 2020 was supposed to reinvigorate the country yet postponement could hit economy hard.

Jobs Aren't Being Destroyed This Fast Elsewhere. Why Is That?
Emmanuel Saez and Gabriel Zucman (NYT) Mar 30, 2020
It's not too late to start protecting employment or to make medical care for Covid-19 free.

The coronavirus crisis is stripping bare Europe's deep fractures
Heather A. Conley and John Kornblum (WP) Mar 30, 2020
The coronavirus will not cause the immediate downfall of the European Union, but it is leaving it a hollow shell.

Saving lives in the pandemic will also save the economy in the long run
Catherine Rampell (WP) Mar 30, 2020
Economists are in agreement that returning to business as usual too soon could have devastating effects for GDP as well as human lives.

Save Capitalism From the Cares Act
Amit Seru and Luigi Zingales (WSJ) Mar 30, 2020
The stimulus is the largest step toward a centrally planned economy that America has ever taken.

China's economy rushed into intensive care
Gordon Watts (AT) Mar 30, 2020
Global recession looms as the world economy is wheeled into the same ICU ward after being infected by Covid-19

The end of the global supply chain
Clyde Prestowitz and Jeff Ferry (BG) Mar 30, 2020
The hidden costs of globalization are becoming apparent.

Not all global problems result from globalization
Joel P. Trachtman (BG) Mar 30, 2020
For those problems that do — including pandemics like COVID-19 — globalization itself can help ameliorate them.

What If the Fed Did Nothing?
Noah Bonn (Mises Wire)I> Mar 30, 2020
As with current Fed policy, there would be both winners and losers if the Fed did nothing. Either way, there will be pain, but without the Fed we'd actually build the foundation for a more sound and lasting economic system.

China's exports of protective medical equipment fell less than its exports of all other products
Chad P. Bown (PIIE) Mar 30, 2020
China's exports to the world of personal protective equipment (PPE) worn by medical professionals when treating coronavirus (COVID-19) declined by only 15 percent in January and February of 2020 compared with the same two-month period in 2019. Meanwhile, China's exports of all other products declined by 17 percent.

"Whatever it takes." Getting into the specifics of fiscal policy to fight COVID-19
Olivier Blanchard (PIIE) Mar 30, 2020
The motto for fiscal policy these days is: "Whatever it takes," and it is indeed the right motto. But what does it mean? What about the specifics? And can we really afford it? Or will we wake up in a few months with a hangover, asking ourselves, "What on earth did we do?"

Is COVID-19 triggering a new emerging-market crisis?
Marek Dabrowski and Marta Domínguez-Jiménez (Bruegel) Mar 30, 2020
Emerging economies have received little attention in the economic debate regarding the COVID-19 pandemic, yet the performance of their primary market indicators, chiefly sovereign debt, foreign exchange and equities, indicate a deep deterioration is taking place. Times of crisis often lead to capital flight from emerging markets as investors seek safe haven assets, while the localised effects of the disease and the collapse in the price of certain key commodities have also been damaging. More worryingly, this appears to be the beginning of the storm, and emerging economies have far less room for fiscal and monetary manoeuvring.

The fiscal consequences of the pandemic
Zsolt Darvas (Bruegel) Mar 30, 2020
The likely economic depression triggered by coronavirus will pose a serious fiscal challenge to some euro-area countries. Given the special circumstances of the pandemic, a European solution is needed, involving more European Central Bank purchases, a significantly increased European Stability Mechanism and some degree of mutualisation of the pandemic-related economic costs.

Europe's COVID-19 Crisis and the Fund's Response
Poul M. Thomsen (IMF) Mar 30, 2020
COVID-19 has struck Europe with stunning ferocity. While we do not know how long the crisis will last, we know that the economic impact will be severe. In Europe's major economies, nonessential services closed by government decree account for about one-third of output. This means that each month these sectors remain closed translates into a 3 percent drop in annual GDP, and that's before other disruptions and spillovers to the rest of the economy are taken into account. A deep European recession this year is a foregone conclusion.

A timeline of central bank responses to the COVID-19 pandemic
Christopher G. Collins and Joseph E. Gagnon (PIIE) Mar 30, 2020
The near certainty of a major global recession means that governments must continue to harness both monetary and fiscal policy to soften the blow. Fiscal policy must do the heaviest lifting, but monetary policy can play an important role. The following timeline displays the actions taken by the central banks of the five largest economies: the US Federal Reserve (Fed), the European Central Bank (ECB), the People's Bank of China (PBOC), the Bank of Japan (BOJ), and the Bank of England (BOE).

Three Percent is a Big Difference
Martin Ravallion (CGD) Mar 30, 2020
There is a little-noticed but important difference between the World Bank's original goal for poverty reduction and the first of the subsequent UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDG1). Both target the Bank's "$1.90 a day" poverty rate. The difference is that the Bank's goal was to reach a 3 percent poverty rate by 2030, while the SDG1 is to "eradicate" poverty by 2030, where "eradicate" means zero. Yet that 3 percent could well make a big difference, as I explain in a new CGD working paper published today, "SDG1: The Last Three Percent."

In the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, export controls on medical supplies like face shields and surgical gowns are slowing the global response to the growing threat. But now, major cereal exporters like Russia, Kazakhstan, and Vietnam are flirting with export restrictions that threaten to roil global food markets and—as we learned during the 2007–08 and 2010–11 food price spikes—augur poorly for global hunger and political stability. These are the wrong tools for addressing concerns about domestic food supplies. If major exporters are concerned about domestic food security, there are better and potentially more politically palatable ways of achieving it.
Cullen S. Hendrix (PIIE) Mar 30, 2020
In the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, export controls on medical supplies like face shields and surgical gowns are slowing the global response to the growing threat. But now, major cereal exporters like Russia, Kazakhstan, and Vietnam are flirting with export restrictions that threaten to roil global food markets and—as we learned during the 2007–08 and 2010–11 food price spikes—augur poorly for global hunger and political stability. These are the wrong tools for addressing concerns about domestic food supplies. If major exporters are concerned about domestic food security, there are better and potentially more politically palatable ways of achieving it.

A Requiem for the Obama-Trump Economy
Justin Fox (Bloomberg View) Mar 30, 2020
The last pre-coronavirus GDP report shows economic growth rates under Trump were … pretty similar to those under Obama.

Fed's Lax Corporate Lending Terms Invite Trouble
Narayana Kocherlakota (Bloomberg View) Mar 30, 2020
Companies need the same kind of limits on leverage and risk put on banks after 2008-09.

Getting the Last Mile Right to Prevent Moral Hazard
Andy Mukherjee (Bloomberg View) Mar 30, 2020
Direct cash payments will help cope with the coronavirus crunch more than freezing finance.

Don't Be a Prudent Saver When There's a Crisis On
Nisha Gopalan (Bloomberg View) Mar 30, 2020
China needs the banks to help rescue the economy. The banks need profits to play the role. Who pays?

Bank Stress Tests Are About to Get Serious
Mark Whitehouse (Bloomberg View) Mar 30, 2020
Officials have a powerful tool to dispel uncertainty in financial markets. They should prepare to use it.

How to Win the Coming Battle Over the U.S. National Debt
Karl W. Smith (Bloomberg View) Mar 30, 2020
It's not too soon to start thinking about the best way to bring back fiscal order after the pandemic subsides.

Fed Should Draw the Line at Backstopping Junk Bonds
Brian Chappatta (Bloomberg View) Mar 30, 2020
It's not the central bank's job to protect every company, or every investor who reached for yield.

The 60/40 Investment Portfolio Should Expand Its Borders
Nir Kaissar (Bloomberg View) Mar 30, 2020
Despite the comfort of home, investors will find more value in overseas stocks.

Oil's Done. Watch the Dollar as the Key Virus Gauge
John Authers (Bloomberg View) Mar 30, 2020
The U.S. currency will be the critical variable for global markets in the next few weeks.

Markets No Longer Know How to Define 'Safe'
Jared Dillian (Bloomberg View) Mar 30, 2020
The prevailing feature of the recent turbulence is that nothing has really worked as it was supposed to work.

The West's Pandemic of Fear
Dominique Moisi (Project Syndicate) Mar 30, 2020
The COVID-19 pandemic is heightening an already existing culture of fear in the West and revealing deeper fractures, both within Europe and between Europe and the United States. But future historians may regard the coronavirus crisis as a game-changing episode that arrested the West's decline.

The West's COVID-19 Learning Curve
Daniel Gros (Project Syndicate) Mar 30, 2020
If central bankers and governments can keep financial markets working and prevent mass bankruptcies during the COVID-19 pandemic, then the now unavoidable global recession could be followed by a vigorous recovery once the virus has been contained. But protecting public health requires Western societies to learn and adapt quickly.

Capitalism's Triple Crisis
Mariana Mazzucato (Project Syndicate) Mar 30, 2020
After the 2008 financial crisis, we learned the hard way what happens when governments flood the economy with unconditional liquidity, rather than laying the foundation for a sustainable and inclusive recovery. Now that an even more severe crisis is underway, we must not repeat the same mistake.

Four Priorities for a Global Pandemic Strategy
Josep Borrell (Project Syndicate) Mar 30, 2020
The world initially met the COVID-19 crisis in an uncoordinated fashion, with too many countries ignoring the warning signs and going it alone. It is now clear that the only way out of it is together.

Welcome to the Post-Virus World
Simon Johnson (Project Syndicate) Mar 30, 2020
Just two months ago, most people believed that random mass death no longer stalked the Earth. Reconciling ourselves with the reality that it does clarifies much, including how to resist the current onslaught, how to fortify ourselves against the darker days that still await, and how to reopen the economy responsibly.

A macro view of the size–productivity challenge in Europe
David Martínez Turégano (VoxEU) Mar 30, 2020
The large differences in labour productivity across EU countries go a long way towards explaining their divergent living standards. To help explain variations in labour productivity, this column focuses on firm size and finds an overall positive relation between firm size and labour productivity. Countries with a distribution skewed to smaller firms – particularly in Southern Europe – show significantly depressed productivity performance. Improving judicial and government efficiency could help stimulate productivity growth in these member states.

Automation versus procreation (aka bots versus tots)
Hal Varian (VoxEU) Mar 30, 2020
Several recent studies have considered the impact of automation on labour demand in the coming decades. But demand is only one side of the labour market – the supply of labour will also change dramatically in the next 50 years due to demographic effects. This column discusses how the net outcome for wages and employment will depend on the relative magnitude of these shifts in demand and supply. The supply-side effects due to demographic forces appear likely to be somewhat greater than the demand-side changes due to automation for at least the next decade, and possibly longer.

The labour market policy response to COVID-19 must save aggregate matching capital
Shigeru Fujita, Giuseppe Moscarini, and Fabien Postel-Vinay (VoxEU) Mar 30, 2020
The COVID-19 pandemic represents an unprecedented shock to labour markets. This column argues that the policy response should balance two objectives: (1) facilitating prompt reallocation of employment to essential activities during the emergency, and (2) maintaining workers' attachment to their previous employers, preserving the aggregate stock of firm-specific human capital, and avoiding persistent mismatch, which would propagate the temporary shock into a prolonged stagnation. The authors make concrete labour market policy proposals and compare them with measures currently being implemented on both sides of the Atlantic.

QE is not helicopter money – and yet it is useful
David Miles (VoxEU) Mar 30, 2020
In response to the current economic crisis, central banks have embarked on operations to purchase huge quantities of government bonds. Accusations that these policies amount to 'printing money' or 'helicopter drops' are unfounded and misleading. This column argues that the asset purchase operations undertaken when interest rates are very low can help greatly in stabilising the economy. These actions allow governments to issue long-term bonds, incur low effective costs in the near horizon, and avoid volatile financial markets.

How microfinance can help entrepreneurs escape the poverty trap
Abhijit Banerjee, Emily Breza, Esther Duflo, and Cynthia Kinnan (VoxEU) Mar 30, 2020
The idea of poverty traps being important for microenterprises is captured in the adage "it takes money to make money". This column reports on a study following households in India exposed to different levels of microfinance. The findings reveal that microfinance has potentially transformative impacts for some entrepreneurs – especially those who without it were stuck in a poverty trap. However, for other households the effect is very small, suggesting that microlenders should consider more screening of households in order to provide some larger loans.

The U.S. Economy Is Uniquely Vulnerable to the Coronavirus
Mark Blyth (FA) Mar 30, 2020
Why America's growth model suggests it has few good options.

Authoritarianism in the Time of the Coronavirus
Florian Bieber (FP) Mar 30, 2020
The pandemic offers dictators—and democracies alike—an opportunity for abuse.

Fighting Pandemic, Europe Divides Again Along North and South Lines
Keith Johnson (FP) Mar 30, 2020
Southern countries push for a eurobond while the wealthy North says "nein."

Beware of Bad Samaritans
Elisabeth Braw (FP) Mar 30, 2020
China and Russia are sending medical aid to Italy and other coronavirus-stricken countries, but their motives aren't so altruistic.

The Uncertainty Channel of the Coronavirus
Sylvain Leduc and Zheng Liu (FRBSF Econ Letter) Mar 30, 2020
The outbreak of the novel coronavirus, or COVID-19, has severely disrupted economic activity through various supply and demand channels. The pandemic can also have pervasive economic impact by raising uncertainty. In the past, sudden and outsized spikes in uncertainty have led to large and protracted increases in unemployment and declines in inflation. These effects are similar to those resulting from declines in aggregate demand. Monetary policy accommodation, such as interest rate cuts, can help cushion the economy from such uncertainty shocks.

Reflections on Democratic Backsliding in Asia
Aurel Croissant & Larry Diamond (GlobalAsia) Mar 30, 2020
Why the deterioration of democratic rule has become a major concern.

Bank dividend payments should be suspended
FT View Mar 31, 2020
Balance sheets must be reinforced to help cope with disruption.

Staying home is a luxury many Indians cannot afford
Amy Kazmin (FT) Mar 31, 2020
Narendra Modi failed to say how millions of employees — mainly rural migrants — were to get by.

The tragedy of two failing superpowers
Martin Wolf (FT) Mar 31, 2020
To address the pandemic, China and the US must not only function. They must function together.

A cost-effective way to help emerging markets fight Covid-19
Alfonso Prat-Gay (FT) Mar 31, 2020
They need balance of payments support if their economies are to 'stop and reboot'.

The window is closing fast on Brazil's economic reform agenda
Bryan Harris (FT) Mar 31, 2020
Coronavirus crisis is further weakening the currency of a country which now faces a sharp recession.

How Powell and Mnuchin Became the Duo in Charge of Saving the Economy
Alan Rappeport and Jeanna Smialek (NYT) Mar 31, 2020
The deal makers face their biggest challenge yet: keeping companies afloat long enough to get America past the coronavirus.

Pain in the Oil Patch
WSJ Mar 31, 2020
Borrowing from the Fed is the best of mostly bad rescue ideas.

The pandemic is about to devastate the developing world
Brian Klaas (WP) Mar 31, 2020
Vulnerable populations across the world are poised for the impact.

As the coronavirus threatens Mexico's economy, its president antagonizes investors
León Krauze (WP) Mar 31, 2020
Mexico's government should work overtime to fortify the country's standing with jittery investors.

Why global oil prices will fall below $10
Tim Daiss (AT) Mar 31, 2020
Covid-19 pandemic and Saudi-Russian supply war have decimated oil prices 65% this year with little hope of a near-term revival

Why the World Has a Dollar Shortage, Despite Massive Fed Action
Daniel Lacalle (Mises Wire) Mar 31, 2020
Can the US dollar lose its global reserve position? Sure it can, but not to a country that decides to commit the same monetary follies as the Fed. Most countries are trying to out-inflate the Fed. And that's good for the Fed.

Rethinking globalisation after coronavirus
Brian Caplen (Banker) Mar 31, 2020
Banking became Balkanised after the financial crisis; expect the same fate for manufacturing.

Why are some stock markets in Asia less affected by coronavirus?
Alicia García-Herrero and Gary Ng (Bruegel) Mar 31, 2020
While Asian markets are in a sea of red, mainland China, New Zealand, Hong Kong and Taiwan are all defying the gravity.

Maintaining Banking System Safety amid the COVID-19 Crisis
Tobias Adrian and Aditya Narain (IMF) Mar 31, 2020
Like the health experts, bank supervisors are responding to a fast-moving and extraordinary situation.

How COVID-19 is laying bare inequality
Enrico Bergamini (Bruegel) Mar 31, 2020
COVID-19 is laying bare socio-economic inequalities and could exacerbate them in the near future. The virus is a risk factor particularly for those at the lower end of the income distribution, who are vulnerable to the interaction of the shock with income, socio-economic and urban inequalities.

Only Global Agencies Can Save the World From Covid-19
Mihir Sharma (Bloomberg View) Mar 31, 2020
If rich nations want to preserve the liberal order, they must invest in the institutions that can help poorer countries survive this crisis.

Time for the U.S. and China to Collaborate, Not Complain
Stephen Roach (Bloomberg View) Mar 31, 2020
The world can't afford a pointless and self-destructive spat between its two leading powers right now.

Will the Dollar Always Rule? Ask the Archduke
John Authers (Bloomberg View) Mar 31, 2020
The Austro-Hungarian krone had a far bigger international presence than the U.S. currency in 1914. The coronavirus could be another Sarajevo moment.

Trump's Energy Dominance Gives Way to Incoherence
Liam Denning (Bloomberg View) Mar 31, 2020
There are better ways to shock-proof America than asking Russia for help and rolling back efficiency.

U.S. Economy Will Be in Trouble If Boomers Don't Come Back to Work
Conor Sen (Bloomberg View) Mar 31, 2020
Growth could be sluggish unless older people laid off because of the coronavirus return to the labor force.

Trump and Putin Are All Talk on Oil Price Plunge
Julian Lee (Bloomberg View) Mar 31, 2020
No amount of bullying or half-hearted diplomacy can stop the plunge in oil demand — and prices — brought on by coronavirus lockdowns worldwide.

Why America Is Losing to COVID-19
William A. Haseltine (Project Syndicate) Mar 31, 2020
There is a very simple explanation for why the COVID-19 outbreak has exploded in the United States. Unlike China, Singapore, and South Korea, the Trump administration has not even bothered to pursue widespread testing, contact tracing, and mandatory two-week quarantines for at-risk individuals.

Will the Economic Strategy Work?
Jean Pisani-Ferry (Project Syndicate) Mar 31, 2020
Because even thriving companies can be killed in a matter of weeks by a recession of the magnitude now confronting the world, advanced-economy governments have reacted in a remarkably similar fashion to the COVID-19 crisis. But extending liquidity lifelines to private businesses and supporting idled workers assumes a short crisis.

The Two Pandemics
Robert J. Shiller (Project Syndicate) Mar 31, 2020
Predicting the stock market at a time like this is hard. To do so well, we would have to predict the direct effects on the economy of the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as all the real and psychological effects of the pandemic of financial anxiety. The two are different, but inseparable.

The COVID-19 Solidarity Test
Kemal Dervis (Project Syndicate) Mar 31, 2020
If the COVID-19 crisis has taught us one thing, it is that the relentless focus on hyper-efficiency and short-term gains of recent decades has given rise to a highly fragile global system. The time has come to build a more resilient world order, based on economic, generational, and international solidarity.

COVID, Fed swaps and the IMF as lender of last resort
Eduardo Levy Yeyati (VoxEU) Mar 31, 2020
Dollar shortages and the real consequences of the COVID pandemic may lead to the next wave of emerging market debt crises. This column argues that Fed swaps mitigate this shortage only for a few selected countries, and traditional international financial institutions' products are ill-designed to assist an emerging market facing a sudden stop. As a broker between central banks and emerging economies, the IMF has a unique opportunity to complete the international financial architecture and fill the lender of last resort role that has long eluded it.

Housing and wealth inequality: A story of policy trade-offs
Nicolas Woloszko and Orsetta Causa (VoxEU) Mar 31, 2020
Rising house prices are causing a housing affordability crisis in many countries, but at the same time they are increasing homeowners' wealth. Governments are faced with the challenge to encourage households to build up housing wealth while also fostering access to good-quality affordable housing. This column shows that, across OECD countries, those countries with higher homeownership rates display much lower wealth inequality, but argues that encouraging homeownership will not help low- and middle-income families accumulate wealth and are likely to conflict with other important policy objectives.

On Geo-Economics in East Asia
Robert Ward and Yuka Koshino (Diplomat) Mar 31, 2020
Geo-economics can be a subtle tool of statecraft, but not all such tools are benign and their deployment can be destabilizing for countries as well as the international system.

The Comeback Nation
Ruchir Sharma (FA) Mar 30, 2020
U.S. economic supremacy has repeatedly proved declinists wrong.

Nepal May Escape the Coronavirus but Not the Crash
Arun Budhathoki (FP) Mar 31, 2020
The remote mountain country has only five confirmed coronavirus cases.

Global Population: Too Few Versus Too Many
Joseph Chamie (YaleGlobal) Mar 31, 2020
Uneven fertility rates create population bulges of young and old.

Will the $2.2 Trillion Coronavirus Aid Package Be Enough?
K@W Mar 31, 2020
Economic recovery in the U.S. will be slow and require continued relief beyond the current measures

Mexico: More Trouble in Store
Brendan McKenna (WF) Mar 31, 2020
The Mexican economy contracted last year, the first annual contraction since the 2008-2009 financial crisis. Given the likely economic impact of COVID-19 and sharp decline in global oil prices, we now expect the economy to experience another annual contraction in 2020.

COVID-19: A Black Swan or a Group of Black Swans?
Azhar Iqbal and Hop Mathews (WF) Mar 31, 2020
While we are just beginning to see the economic impacts of COVID-19 appear in the data, it is clear that what we will see in the coming months will be truly unprecedented. One can look at COVID-19 as a singular economic shock, but its longer-term implications for different sectors of the economy may vary. In this report, we raise the question of whether the COVID-19 is a black swan or a group of black swans.

Where Will That $2 Trillion Come from Anyway?
Jay H. Bryson, Michael Pugliese, Mike Schumacher, and Zachary Griffiths (WF) Mar 31, 2020
Net Treasury issuance is set to surge in the coming weeks and months. At present, we look for the federal budget deficit to be $2.4 trillion in FY 2020 and $1.7 trillion in FY 2021. If realized, the FY 2020 federal budget deficit would be the biggest deficit as a share of the economy since World War II.

When the Pandemic Hits the Most Vulnerable
Robert Malley and Richard Malley (FA) Mar 30, 2020
Developing countries are hurtling toward coronavirus catastrophe.