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Congrats Mig. Careful you don't become one of the "serious" people...life's too short. I particularly liked the early speculation that the spike in overnight borrowing might just have been a "A fat finger mistake?"

Index of Frank's Diaries
by Frank Schnittger (mail Frankschnittger at hot male dotty communists) on Thu Feb 24th, 2011 at 09:21:38 AM EST
I don't know about becoming "serious" but I've become unintelligible... which is a bad sign.
I read it , and it is too technical.. I hope bankers read it and get it.


Keynesianism is intellectually hard, as evidenced by the inability of many trained economists to get it - Paul Krugman
by Carrie (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Thu Feb 24th, 2011 at 09:28:03 AM EST
[ Parent ]
kcurie is well known for sand-bagging us about the true extent of his knowledge and perspicacity.

paul spencer
by paul spencer (paulgspencer@gmail.com) on Thu Feb 24th, 2011 at 11:12:19 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Really? Well I did get some things.. but some ideas.. really truly no clue.. I now know that I do not really get how the ECB works... I need to know how a balance sheet works .. and quickly if  want to get anything.

I think most bankers in eurointelligence will get the main idea... I do hope he gets a man editorial in the FT (the only real left-wing newspaper on Earth)

A pleasure

I therefore claim to show, not how men think in myths, but how myths operate in men's minds without their being aware of the fact. Levi-Strauss, Claude

by kcurie on Thu Feb 24th, 2011 at 11:47:53 AM EST
[ Parent ]
kcurie:
the FT (the only real left-wing newspaper on Earth)
Can you imagine saying that in 2007?

Keynesianism is intellectually hard, as evidenced by the inability of many trained economists to get it - Paul Krugman
by Carrie (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Thu Feb 24th, 2011 at 12:02:04 PM EST
[ Parent ]
Well, in 2007 they were cheerleaders for the credit bubble. Still are, of course, but today the actual needs of the economy are somewhat more closely aligned with their recommendations.

A classic case of being right for all the wrong reasons, if you ask me.

- Jake

Friends come and go. Enemies accumulate.

by JakeS (JangoSierra 'at' gmail 'dot' com) on Thu Feb 24th, 2011 at 06:31:40 PM EST
[ Parent ]
Remember they were one of my main source for my "watch out" diaries. They had Gillian Tett writing in extensive detail on the shadow banking system and other arcane corners of the markets.

The front page and headlines were cheerleading, but the full content of the paper was much more useful.

Wind power

by Jerome a Paris (etg@eurotrib.com) on Fri Feb 25th, 2011 at 04:11:34 AM EST
[ Parent ]
kcurie:
Well I did get some things.. but some ideas...

While I was reading the article I felt like I was starting to understand something. But I have to go back to the article to get that feeling back.  :-)

"It is not necessary to have hope in order to persevere."
by ARGeezer (ARGeezer a in a circle eurotrib daught com) on Thu Feb 24th, 2011 at 01:43:28 PM EST
[ Parent ]
Then the article is a keeper!

Keynesianism is intellectually hard, as evidenced by the inability of many trained economists to get it - Paul Krugman
by Carrie (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Thu Feb 24th, 2011 at 02:20:27 PM EST
[ Parent ]
Definitely, but I think you might consider posting your original. I suspect that Muchau's "turbidity reduction" efforts might have also deleted some content.

"It is not necessary to have hope in order to persevere."
by ARGeezer (ARGeezer a in a circle eurotrib daught com) on Thu Feb 24th, 2011 at 07:44:26 PM EST
[ Parent ]
It doesn't seem so. He removed links to sources we have discussed in this comment thread, a jab at traders' attention spans, a quote from a clueful analyst, and broke some longwinded periods into bite-sized sentences. Some of the more conversational turns of phrase also disappeared.

Keynesianism is intellectually hard, as evidenced by the inability of many trained economists to get it - Paul Krugman
by Carrie (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Fri Feb 25th, 2011 at 02:12:25 AM EST
[ Parent ]
I really do not get most of the letter.. I get humor much mroe better

http://avionesdecercanias.blogspot.com/2011/02/se-hacen-mayores-y-famosos.html

But I do get taht steilization is nonsense.

Buying public debt at fix amrket prices does not geenrate inflation, it makes the EC work as market-maker of last resort... tat's wat the ECB should be doing , at least to avoid anotehr financial catastrophe... not that this is good enough, but at least hey should do it.

Of course, ECB should be pushing for eurobonds, transfer payments , inflation in Germany and/or quantitaive easing and/or printing money to elimiante some private debt.

A pleasure

I therefore claim to show, not how men think in myths, but how myths operate in men's minds without their being aware of the fact. Levi-Strauss, Claude

by kcurie on Fri Feb 25th, 2011 at 06:26:33 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Ah, popularisation of technical content, one of my favourite topics. And now you have sort of asked for advice.

What you write always depend on audience but for a casual but interested reader, the following are problems:

* The conclusion. A clearly stated and important conclusion will help the reader in getting the big picture when the details are hard.

A critique of the ECB's liquidity policies

In its deflationary zeal, the ECB is draining an increasing amount of cash - in the form of one-week deposits - from the money markets to offset its modest purchases of sovereign Euro bonds.

A critique of the ECB's liquidity policies

The ECB treats the Euro as it were on the gold standard and not a fiat currency.

It is good that you state it early and return to it in the end, but it is to convulated and you fail to state why it is important.

The ECB is depressing the economy by treating the euro as gold coins instead of the fiat currency it is. (Or strangling in an even more casual setting.)

* Stumbling blocs. Having several terms that cause a bit of thinking in the same, dense sentence gives the reader a sentence that is hard to pass. The reader easily thinks that he or she is not the audience and moves on.

A critique of the ECB's liquidity policies

A consequence of this policy is the steady rise in interbank rates to a point that the Euribor 1-year is now touching 1.75 per cent, which is the rate of the MLF

Interbank rates, Euribor 1-year, MLF (a Phillipino guerilla? No, wait it says something in the beginning) and a number that might be relevant. Now this sentence might be perfectly adapted to an audience that uses these terms on a daily basis, but it easily becomes a stumbling bloc for those that do not.

With easy terminology it would go something like this A consequence of this policy is the steady rise in the rates when banks borrow from banks, to a point where it now touches the rate at which ECB borrows unlimited funds to banks.

But then again, that might be to easy for a banking audience.

* Over-information in graphs. For the knowledgable, the more information the better, but for the casual reader it is confusing. Correct me if I am wrong, but you only use ECB deposit, ECB MLF and Euribor 1-year for the argument, so the rest could be cut. And should be if you wanat easy understanding.

If studied, I would guess that most readers are stumbled by the paragraph above and then halts at the graph, upon which they mentally give up understanding it, even if reading the rest.

* Expanding the argument.

A critique of the ECB's liquidity policies

Since May the ECB has failed to fully sterilise its bond purchases on two occasions, first at the end of June and then from December to February. It does appear that this past week the ECB succeeded in draining €76.5bn of liquidity to match its Security Market Programme holdings. Each failure to sterilise worried the inflation hawks. This is one of the reasons why the ECB wants the European Financial Stability Facility to do the bond buying.

But the hawks are wrong.

You have already shown that ECB is strangling the economy:

In countries where variable-rate mortgages are indexed to the 1-year Euribor, such a rise in interbank interest rates near the bottom of the recession could spell trouble.

Now you are arguing about why. To be easy to follow, it should be founded in the conclusion (both before and after the main body of arguments) and marked upon commencing.

So what you want to show is:
The ECB is depressing the economy by treating the euro as gold coins instead of the fiat currency it is. This is done based on faulty ideas of public debt always being inflationary.

And then when the second part starts mark it by something like "if we look at why this is happening" and then dive into the murky world of inflation hawk ideas.

Being taken serious often depends of marking your belonging in the serious group by being hard to read for people outside your area, so it is a trade-off.

Sweden's finest (and perhaps only) collaborative, leftist e-newspaper Synapze.se

by A swedish kind of death on Fri Feb 25th, 2011 at 07:31:56 AM EST
[ Parent ]
excellent advice.

it would actually be fun to see two versions side by side, the wonky and the lay, just to see how wide the freaking gap is.

that gap... that yawning gap, into which fall trillions, (never to be seen again?).

to enable the masses to crack the code, that's the challenge, so the masters of the universe know what they do is in the sunshine.

down with obfuscatory jargon (and the proverbial multitude of sins it covers), on with the rosetta stone tactics.

'The history of public debt is full of irony. It rarely follows our ideas of order and justice.' Thomas Piketty

by melo (melometa4(at)gmail.com) on Fri Feb 25th, 2011 at 08:40:22 AM EST
[ Parent ]
You're right, of course.

I evidently wrote my column for what an economist audience, but I did try to assume less knowledge in the audience, which made the thing longer and at times more convoluted. Münchau cut that down significantly.

I'm reminded of The Onion classic Manmohan Singh - The First Sikh Prime Minister Of...Okay, Here's What A Sikh Is

As the first Sikh elected to India's highest office, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has helped change the face of... okay, just so we don't get too ahead of ourselves here, we should probably explain what a Sikh is.


Keynesianism is intellectually hard, as evidenced by the inability of many trained economists to get it - Paul Krugman
by Carrie (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Fri Feb 25th, 2011 at 10:50:45 AM EST
[ Parent ]
A swedish kind of death:

It is good that you state it early and return to it in the end, but it is to convulated and you fail to state why it is important.

The ECB is depressing the economy by treating the euro as gold coins instead of the fiat currency it is. (Or strangling in an even more casual setting.)

How about this?

Migeru:

(basically, the ECB likes to pretend that issuing fiat Euros is as difficult as shitting gold ingots).


Keynesianism is intellectually hard, as evidenced by the inability of many trained economists to get it - Paul Krugman
by Carrie (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Fri Feb 25th, 2011 at 10:55:34 AM EST
[ Parent ]
The pain would have to be balanced against the utility. :-)

"It is not necessary to have hope in order to persevere."
by ARGeezer (ARGeezer a in a circle eurotrib daught com) on Fri Feb 25th, 2011 at 04:43:54 PM EST
[ Parent ]
Works perfectly for me.

Sweden's finest (and perhaps only) collaborative, leftist e-newspaper Synapze.se
by A swedish kind of death on Sat Feb 26th, 2011 at 03:38:47 PM EST
[ Parent ]

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