Introduction
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The
financial crisis of 2007-08, also known as the global financial crisis, is
considered by many economists to have been the worst financial crisis since
Great Depression of the 1930s.
·
It
threatened the collapse of large financial institutions, which was prevented by
the bailout of banks by national governments, but stock markets still dropped
worldwide.
·
In
many areas, the housing market also suffered, resulting in evictions,
foreclosures and prolonged unemployment.
·
The
crisis played a significant role in the failure of key businesses, declines in
consumer wealth estimated in trillions of U.S. dollars, and a downturn in
economic activity leading to the 2008-2012 global recession and contributing to
the European sovereign-debt crisis.
·
The
active phase of the crisis, which manifested as a liquidity crisis, can be
dated from August 9, 2007, when BNP Paribas terminated withdrawals from three
hedge funds citing ‘a complete evaporation of liquidity’.
Causes
·
The
crisis was the result of ‘high risk’, complex financial products; undisclosed
conflicts of interest; the failure of regulators, the credit rating agencies,
and the market itself to rein in the excesses of Wall Street – Levin-Cohen
Report.
·
The
financial crisis was avoidable and was caused by ‘widespread failures in
financial regulation and supervision’, ‘dramatic failures of corporate
governance and risk management at many systemically important financial
institutions’, ‘a combination of excessive borrowing, risky investments, and
lack of transparency’ by financial institutions, ill preparation and
inconsistent action by government that ‘added to uncertainty and panic’, a
‘systemic breakdown in accountability and ethics’, ‘collapsing mortgage-lending
standards and the mortgage securitization pipeline’, deregulation of
over-the-counter derivatives, especially credit default swaps, and ‘the
failures of credit rating agencies’ to correctly price risk – The Financial
Crisis Inquiry Commission.
·
The
1999 repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act effectively removed the separation
between investment banks and depository bank in the United States.
·
Research
into the causes of the financial crisis has also focused on the role of
interest rate spreads.
·
The
immediate cause or trigger of the crisis was the bursting of the U.S. housing
bubble, which peaked in 2004. Already-rising default rates on ‘subprime’ and
adjustable-rate mortgages (ARM) began to increase quickly thereafter.
As banks began to give out more loans to potential home
owners, housing prices began to rise. Easy availability of credit in the U.S.,
fueled by large funds after the Russian debt crisis and Asian financial crisis
of the 1997-1998 period, led to a housing construction boom and facilitated debt-financed
consumer spending. Lax lending standards and rising real estate prices also
contributed to the real estate bubble. Loans of various types were easy to
obtain and consumers assumed an unprecedented debt load. As part of the housing
and credit booms, the number of financial agreements called mortgage-backed
securities (MBS) and collateralized debt obligations (CDO), which derived their
value from mortgage payments and housing prices, greatly increased. Such
financial innovation enabled institutions and investors around the world to
invest in the U.S. housing market. As housing prices declined, major global
financial institutions that had borrowed and invested heavily in subprime MBS reported
significant losses. Falling prices also resulted in homes worth less than the
mortgage loan, providing a financial incentive to enter foreclosure. The
ongoing foreclosure epidemic that began in late 2006 in the U.S. continued to
drain wealth from consumers and eroded the financial strength of banking
institutions. Defaults and losses on other loan types also increased
significantly as the crisis expanded from the housing market to other parts of
the economy. Total losses are estimated in the trillions of U.S. dollars
globally.
From 2004 to 2007, the top five U.S. investment banks each
significantly increased their financial leverage, which increased their
vulnerability to a financial shock. Changes in capital requirements, intended
to keep U.S. banks competitive with their European counterparts, allowed lower
risk weightings for AAA securities. These five institutions reported over $4.1
trillion in debt for fiscal year 2007, about 30% of USA nominal GDP for 2007.
Lehman Brothers went bankrupt and was liquidated, Bear Stearns and Merrill
Lynch were sold at fire-sale prices, and Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley
became commercial banks, subjecting themselves to more stringent regulation.
With the exception of Lehman, these companies required for received government
support.
Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, two U.S. government-sponsored
enterprises, owned or guaranteed nearly $5 trillion in mortgage obligations at
the time they were placed into conservatorship by the U.S. government in
September 2008.
These seven entities were highly leveraged and had $9
trillion in debt or guarantee obligations; yet they were not subject to the
same regulation as depository banks.
Impact on Financial
Markets
1. The U.S. stock market peaked in October 2007, when the Dow
Jones Industrial Average index exceeded 14,000 points. It then entered a
pronounced decline, which accelerated markedly in October 2008. By March 2009,
the Dow Jones average had reached a trough of around 6,600.
2. The first notable event signaling a possible financial
crisis occurred in the United Kingdom on August 9, 2007, when BNP Paribas,
citing ‘a complete evaporation of liquidity’, blocked withdrawals from three
hedge funds. The significance of this event was not immediately recognized but
soon led to a panic as investors and savers attempted to liquidate assets
deposited in highly leveraged financial institutions.
One of the first victims was Northern Rock, a medium-sized
British bank. The highly leveraged nature of its business led the bank to
request security from the Bank of England. However, the British government
relented, and the bank was taken into public hands. Northern Rock’s problems
proved to be an early indication of the troubles that would soon befall other
bank and financial institutions.
3. The first visible institution to run into trouble in the
United States was the Southern California-based IndyMac, a spin-off of
Countrywide Financial. The primary causes of its failure were largely
associated with its business strategy of originating and securitizing Alt-A
loans on a large scale. The strategy resulted in rapid growth and a high
concentration of risky assets. IndyMac often made loans without verification of
the borrower’s income or assets, and to borrowers with poor credit histories.
When home prices declined in the latter half of 2007 and the secondary mortgage
market collapsed, IndyMac was forced to hold $10.7 billion of loans it could
not sell in the secondary market. Its reduced liquidity was further exacerbated
in late June 2008 when account holders withdrew $1.55 billion or about 7.5% of
IndyMac’s deposits.
4. In September 2008, the crisis hit its most critical stage.
There was the equivalent of a bank run on the money market funds, which
frequently invest in commercial paper issued by corporations to fund their
operations and payrolls. Withdrawal from money markets was $144.5 billion
during one week, versus $7.1 billion the week prior. This interrupted the
ability of corporations to rollover their short-tern debt.
5. There is a direct relationship between declines in wealth
and declines in consumption and business investment, which along with government
spending, represent the economic engine. Between June 2007 and November 2008,
Americans lost an estimated average of more than a quarter of their collective
net worth. By early November 2008, a broad U.S. stock index the S&P 500 was
down 45% from its 2007 high. Housing prices had dropped 20% from their 2006
peak, with futures markets signaling a 30-35% potential drop. Total home equity
in the United States, which was valued $13 trillion at its peak in 2006, had
dropped to $8.8 trillion by mid-2008 and was still falling in late 2008.
Further, U.S. homeowners had extracted significant equity in
their homes in the years leading up to the crisis, which they could no longer
do once housing prices collapsed. Free cash used by consumers from equity
extraction doubled from $627 billion in 2001 to $1,428 billion in 2005 as the
housing bubble built, a total of nearly $5 trillion over the period.
The problem with the economy is the loss of close to $6
trillion in housing wealth and an even larger amount of stock wealth.
6. The crisis rapidly developed and spread into a global
economic shock, resulting in a number of European bank failures, declines in
various stock indexes, and large reductions in the market value of equities and
commodities. Both MBS and CDO were purchased by corporate and institutional
investors globally. Derivatives such as credit default swaps also increased the
linkage between large financial institutions. Moreover, the de-leveraging of
financial institutions, as assets were sold to pay back obligations that could
not be refinanced in frozen credit markets, further accelerated the solvency
crisis and caused a decrease in international trade.
Effects on the Global
Economy
The Brooking Institution reported in June 2009 that U.S.
consumption accounted for more than a third of the growth in global consumption
between 2000 and 2007. “The US economy has been spending too much and borrowing
too much for years and the rest of the world depended on the U.S. consumer as a
source of global demand”. With the recession in the U.S. and increased savings
rate of U.S. consumers, declines in growth elsewhere have been dramatic. For
the first quarter of 2009, the annualized rate of decline in GDP was 14.4% in
Germany, 15.2% in Japan, 7.4% in the U.K., 18% in Latvia, 9.8% in the Euro area
and 21.5% for Mexico.
Some developing countries that had seen strong economic
growth saw significant slowdowns. For example, growth forecasts in Cambodia
show a fall from more that 10% in 2007 to close to zero in 2009, and Kenya may
achieve only 3-4% growth in 2009, down from 7% in 2007.
The World Bank reported in February 2009 that the Arab World
was far less severely affected by the credit crunch. With generally good
balance of payments positions coming into the crisis or with alternative
sources of financing for their large current account deficits, such as
remittances, Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) or foreign aid, Arab countries
were able to avoid going to the market in the latter part of 2008. This group
was in the best position to absorb the economic shocks.
European Debt Crisis
The European debt crisis is a multi-year debt crisis that has
been taking place in the European Union since the end of 2009. Several euro
zone member states (Greece, Portugal, Ireland, Spain and Cyprus) were unable to
repay or refinance their government debt or to bail out over-indebted banks
under their national supervision without the assistance of third parties like
other European countries, the European Central Bank (ECB), or the International
Monetary Fund (IMF). The euro zone crisis resulted from a combination of
complex factors, including the globalization of finance; easy credit conditions
during the 2002-2008 period that encouraged high-risk lending and borrowing
practices; the financial crisis of 2008-2012; fiscal policy choices related to
government revenues and expenses; and approaches used by states to bail out
troubled banking industries and private bondholders, assuming private debt
burdens or socializing losses.
Japan and the Global
Financial Crisis
The economic turmoil of 2007 and 2008 had mixed effects on
the Japanese economy. Going into the crisis, Japanese banks – and consumers
more generally – held much less debt than their counterparts in Europe and the
United States. As a result, no major Japanese bank collapsed during the crisis,
and some Japanese financial institutions were well-placed to swoop in and
purchase assets at greatly reduced prices as the crisis progressed. Japan’s
iconic automaker Toyota, however, experienced the first yearly losses in its
history in 2008. The Japanese yen soared in value during the latter half of
2008 as international governments dropped interest rates, undermining the
profitability of the “carry trade” through which many investors had bet on
interest rate disparities. By April 2009, however, sagging global demand had
taken a toll on Japan’s economy, nearly halving the country’s exports and
leading Tokyo into its first trade deficit in thirty years.
Emerging and Developing
Economies Drive Global Economic Growth
Advanced economies led global economic growth prior to the
financial crisis with ‘emerging’ and ‘developing’ economies lagging behind. The
crisis completely overturned this relationship. The International Monetary Fund
found that ‘advanced’ economies accounted for only 31% of the global GDP while
emerging and developing economies including China ($6,851 billion incremental
GDP from 2007 to 2014), Brazil ($877 billion), India ($809 Billion), Russia
($758 billion), Indonesia ($424 billion), accounted for 69% of global GDP form
2007 to 2014.
Summary
World Economy from
2007-2011
·
On
9 August 2007 BNP Paribas announced that it was ceasing activity in three hedge
funds that specialized in US mortgage debt. Nobody knew how big the losses were
or how great the exposure of individual banks actually was, so trust evaporated
overnight and banks stopped doing business with each other.
·
On
15 September 2008, the US government allowed the investment bank Lehman
Brothers to go bankrupt. When Lehman Brothers went down, the notion that all
banks were “too big to fail’ no longer held true, with the result that every
bank was deemed to be risky. Within a month, the threat of a domino effect
through the global financial system forced western governments to inject vast
sums of capital into their banks to prevent them collapsing.
·
The
winter of 2008-09 saw coordinated action by the newly formed G20 group of
developed and developing nations in an attempt to prevent recession turning
into a slump. Interest rates were cut to the bone, fiscal stimulus packages of
varying sizes announced, and electronic money created through quantitative
easing. At the London G20 summit on 2 April 2009, world leaders committed
themselves to a $5 trillion fiscal expansion, and extra $1.1 trillion of resources
to help the International Monetary Fund and other global institutions boost
jobs and growth, and to reform of the banks. From this point, when the global
economy was on the turn, international co-operation started to disintegrate as
individual countries pursued their own agendas.
·
9
May 2010 marked the point at which the focus of concern switched from the
private sector to the public sector. By the time the IMF and the European Union
announced they would provide financial help to Greece, the issue was no longer
the solvency of banks but the solvency of governments. Budget deficits had
ballooned during the recession, mainly as a result of lower tax receipts and
higher non-discretionary welfare spending, but also because of the fiscal
packages announced in the winter of 2008-09. Austerity became the new
watchword, affecting policy decisions in the UK, the euro zone and, most
recently in the US, the country that stuck with expansionary fiscal policy the
longest.
·
The
dressing down given to Washington by Beijing following S&P announcement
was, however, telling. Growth rates of close to 10% mean that the moment China
overtakes the US is getting closer all the time, and the communists in the east
now feel bold enough to tell the capitalists in the west how to run their
economies.
Current Economic
Problems
·
The
US Federal Reserve has finally raised interest rates for the first time in
almost a decade. Income and wealth inequality in the United States has grown
steadily since the global financial crisis erupted in 2008, but monetary-policy
normalization could mark the beginning of the end of this trend. Americans
earned 4% less income in 2014 than they did in 2000, and for the first time in
more than 40 years, middle-class Americans no longer constitute a majority of
the population. America’s 20 wealthiest people now own more wealth than the
bottom half of the entire population. Ironically, this trend was exacerbated by
the policy response to the financial crisis. While the recession of 2007-2008
caused higher-income groups to suffer more than lower-income groups, the
opposite has been true since 2009. Since then, about 95% of all income gains
have gone to the top 1%. As the Fed slowly raises interest rates, those
middle-class families holding their hard-earned savings at the bank will
finally start realizing some return on their deposits.
·
The
Chinese economy now confronts – real and financial – the twin challenges. On
the real side, China needs to achieve a transition away from unsustainable
investment-led growth. China’s investment rate of 41% of GDP was
extraordinarily high. But by 2010-2011, it had soared to 47%, as the
authorities unleashed a real estate- and infrastructure-construction boom aimed
at offsetting the threat to exports and employment arising from advanced-country
deleveraging. As China shifts to a more sustainable consumption-led growth
model, it needs better investment – and less of it. In the meantime, China’s
financial challenge is intensifying. While the growth in services is generally
desirable, the expansion of China’s financial services – currently the
economy’s fastest-growing service industry - is generating serious risks.
Chinese policymakers now face a dilemma. Constraining new credit would fuel a
surge in defaults on bank loans and wealth-management products, and would cause
investment to contract much more rapidly than consumption can feasibly grow.
But allowing the credit boom to continue will create even bigger problems in
the future. For now, China’s leaders seem to be going with the “more credit”
option. Bank lending has accelerated over recent months. Total debt is still
growing at a faster pace than nominal GDP. And if current trends hold, the debt
burden could amount to well over 300% of GDP by 2020. (Recently, the IMF has
agreed to add the Chinese yean to its reserve currency basket. In a statement,
IMF Managing Director Christine Lagarde noted the yuan’s inclusion is a “clear
representation of the reforms” taking place in China. “The continuation and
deepening of these efforts will bring about a more robust international
monetary and financial system, which in turn will support the growth and
stability of China and global economy,” Lagarde said. Lagarde and the United
States had supported its inclusion in the basket, known as Special Drawing
Rights (SDR). It will join the euro, yen, pound and dollar in the reserves
basket. The yuan will have about an 11 percent weighting in the SDR.)
