Stephen Roach, a professor at Yale University and former non-executive chairman for Morgan Stanley in Asia, talks about the European debt crisis and the outlook for the euro. Here is a direct link.
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Stephen Roach, a professor at Yale University and former non-executive chairman for Morgan Stanley in Asia, talks about the European debt crisis and the outlook for the euro. Here is a direct link.
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We’ve all played the board game Monopoly at one time or another. The basic goal of the game is to play until all opponents are bankrupt… the winner takes it all! However, at times, a kind-hearted mother may give her child some her funny money just to extend the game a little longer and keep her child happy. A generous player may give his friend and opponent, a bankrupt Monopolist, a funny-money loan. Or, the bank might be robbed in joint consent, in the interest of harmony or the fun of the game. The rules might be adjusted, softened, or contorted to help.
This is where we enter the realm of the “European version” of Monopoly. In this version of the game, one where the rules are not strictly adhered to as agreed in the beginning, one where “social goodness and solidarity” outweigh the rules, the game of Monopoly can take forever. In fact, in this mode, the winning player that has all the money (i.e., the Germans…) might be considered over-ambitious and ruthless, particularly if he does not show a little flexibility.
Promises and rules will be broken at the whim of a bureaucrat’s pen, all in the interest of extending this game of Monopoly a little longer.