¿Nueva vida para los DEG?

Apr 24, 2017 Mohamed A. El-Erian

WASHINGTON, DC – El ascenso de movimientos políticos antiglobalización y la amenaza del proteccionismo comercial han llevado a algunos a preguntarse si la economía mundial no necesita una base multilateral más sólida que permita reducir el riesgo de fragmentación. No hay que olvidar que el esquema actual (hoy bajo intensa presión) surgió del fuerte deseo de nuestros antecesores, tras la Segunda Guerra Mundial, de minimizar el riesgo de políticas nacionales de “empobrecer al vecino” como las que en los años treinta obstaculizaron el crecimiento, la prosperidad y la estabilidad mundial.

Hace casi cincuenta años, consideraciones similares impulsaron la creación de los derechos especiales de giro del Fondo Monetario Internacional, precursores de una moneda mundial. Hoy, el renovado interés en la estabilidad del sistema monetario internacional hace que algunos (incluso dentro del FMI) se pregunten si reformular los DEG puede ayudar a revigorizar el multilateralismo.

Uno de los motivos que impulsaron inicialmente la creación de los DEG fue el temor a que una moneda nacional no pudiera a la vez satisfacer las necesidades de liquidez del mundo y actuar como un activo de reserva mundial confiable (lo que los economistas llaman “dilema de Triffin”). Con la creación de una moneda no nacional gestionada por el FMI, los países miembros buscaban introducir un activo oficial de reserva que permitiera sostener y reforzar el sistema monetario internacional.

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Mohamed A. El-Erian

Writing for PS since 2010
112 Commentaries

Mohamed A. El-Erian, Chief Economic Adviser at Allianz, the corporate parent of PIMCO where he served as CEO and co-Chief Investment Officer, was Chairman of US President Barack Obama’s Global Development Council. He previously served as CEO of the Harvard Management Company and Deputy Director at the International Monetary Fund. He was named one of Foreign Policy’s Top 100 Global Thinkers in 2009, 2010, 2011, and 2012. He is the author, most recently, of The Only Game in Town: Central Banks, Instability, and Avoiding the Next Collapse.

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Barry McHugh May 4, 2017

IMF RISKS BEING CAPTURED BY ITS OWN MODEL IN THIS Specifically, one would think that it would need to lend to the SDR basket countries initially ( it has to China / See Stndard Chartered in Reuters). Then if interest rate normalisation or more persistent rate rises occurred it would take losses on its 'investments' being bond issues to SDR basket countries (poor country rates are already up ie Argentina). So, how it deals wit te loss makingprobably won't be specified but it would want to mitigate against such losses on its issues and so would continue to issue to SDR basket countries so that their currencies were stable enough so that imports based inflation did not occur in this countries. Under that scenario it is supporting SDR basket countries and positioned less favourably to support poorer countries. So it backs itself into a corner and can't perform its mandate in respect of poorer countries. Poorer countries are effectively dammed from that point forward and would need to seek help from alternatives such as the Asia Development Bank
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william kim May 1, 2017

I think we need SDR currency that can be used in the market. Too few International currency too huge global economic trade. So we need tradable SDR to make capital balance among the country.
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jean nutson Apr 30, 2017

Stability in the global financial system is very conceptual and impractical regardless of whatever meaning it's assigned due to the very nature of money as a flowing and dynamic asset that changes in value , worth and even state as it undergoes it transactional processes between parties inside and across borders radically increasing a potential tilt towards a particular direction in terms of quantity and value. Another point worth noting is that money is an evolutionary product of assets mostly natural in form of commodities such as gold etc, and lately artificial such as the waveband or airtime and all these are linked to their national origins, considering the fact that the IMF is not a nation and it's assets provided by individuals and national governments the idea of having it's own currency will be quite unusual if not unlikely since the actual and practical determination of the value or worth of such a currency could prove daunting potentially rendering such a currency almost valueless thus reducing it to a mere piece of paper.
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Per Kurowski Apr 25, 2017

“A mixture of thousand solutions, many of them inadequate, may lead to a flexible world that can bend with the storms. A world obsessed with Best Practices may calcify its structure and break with any small wind.”

http://subprimeregulations.blogspot.com/2003/03/my-comments-on-world-banks-strategic.html
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Paul Daley Apr 25, 2017

The SDR was meant to supplement world reserves back in the days when the US ran current account surpluses or small deficits. That's not the case today; the world is awash in reserves. The problem now lies in the use of those reserves. The FED and other central banks have used their powers of seigniorage to prop up asset prices and entrench current account deficits. Moving the power of seigniorage out of the hands of central bank officials would help, but that can be done nationally. There is no need for an international custodian for reserve creation, nor is there likely to be much support for such a custodian.
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Jose araujo Apr 24, 2017

So the IMF is a bankrupted, incompetent institution, that acts like the shylock for the EU and the FED forcing countries into misery without any consideration for theire economic future.

And El Erian wants the IMF to be the worlds Central Bank... Fortunatly he is wrong most (all) of the time
- Steve Hurst Apr 24, 2017
  
  Jose
  
  The reality is it is all about milking the taxpayer
  
  It's best to not get into the situation of borrowing from the IMF because they are effectively the lender of last resort. Lenders of last resort tend to lay the conditions out not the borrower. That's why such lenders tend to have high profits
  
  'Ahead of the payment of €462 million by Greece to the IMF on Thursday 9 April, figures released by the Jubilee Debt Campaign show that the IMF has made €2.5 billion of profit out of its loans to Greece since 2010. If Greece does repay the IMF in full this will rise to €4.3 billion by 2024.'
  http://jubileedebt.org.uk/news/imf-made-e2-5-billion-profit-greece-loans
  
  Fire sales are equally an opportunity as per PIMCO being interested in double digit returns on dumped toxic assets
  
  Here's how it goes - 'Private bidders, which could be other banks or individuals or even hedge funds, would bid for the assets. Let's say the winning bid was $100 million. Well, private investors would put up about 7 percent, or $7 million. The Treasury would put up an equal amount, another $7 million. The rest of the purchase could be financed by loans that would be guaranteed by the FDIC. Those loans would cover about 85 percent of the purchase price. Now, let's say the partnerships sold the assets later for a profit. The government and the private investors would share equally in that profit, even though the government risked much more money. If there were losses, the private investor and the government would share in the losses, up to about 15 percent. Beyond that, all the losses would be absorbed by the government.'
  http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=102280141
  
  Some of these toxic assets were bought circa 7 cents in the dollar (from memory)
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- Jose araujo Apr 24, 2017
  
  Actually I'm quite surprised, I've allways taken El Erian for a gold standard guy...
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stephan Edwards Apr 24, 2017

Trust the IMF .... to basically be the worlds central bank... with their track record???? Can't speak for anyone else but a world run by and for banks??? ..........NO THANK YOU. The IMF has essentially acted has hired gun for the big banks for years and now you want to giv them more power???
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Marc Laventurier Apr 24, 2017

So long as vastly more progressive estate, capital gains and income taxes can ultimately be denominated in SDR/XDR worldwide, why not?
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Steve Hurst Apr 24, 2017

So - How can a SDR designed to stop beggar-thy-neighbour policies ameliorate beggar-thy-neighbour behaviour which is intrinsic in National internal de facto process

I am afraid you appear overestimate the effect any such supra national jaw-jaw can have when for the average Joe the problem is being beggared by his fellow nationals not just the imaginary average Ho in China . Further when such beggaring obviously reduces Joes's disposable income how can an SDR raise the contents of Joe's wallet so he feels like buying the goods the SDR is proposed to encourage. The problem in trade volumes flattening in a consumer society suggests that the consumer is sick not the trade

What is debatable to me is the idea that seems to be relentlessly postulated overtly or implicitly pretty much everywhere I look that the whole world should form a giant circle with each one servicing the fellow in front from behind and that this can evermore expand to infinity and beyond and SDR's and the like will lubricate a process when the problem is the process

Here is a short piece from Scott Galloway detailing the income distribution problem that no SDR will address

http://uk.businessinsider.com/scott-galloway-explains-big-four-amazon-apple-google-facebook-2017-4
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