Saturday, September 14, 2013

Bank Credit vs. Retail Sales


Click to enlarge.

It was such a well-behaved parabola; such a shame to see it fail.

Source Data:
St. Louis Fed: Custom Chart

1 comment:

  1. Alternate catch phrase:

    It was such an ill-intentioned parabola; such a sham to see it.

    While Professor Blinder is correct that finance is like the circulatory system of the economy body, he is being too generous to the banks is saying that it is wrong to think of “the financial markets as a kind of glorified casino with little relevance to the real economy.”

    It’s not wrong. It’s exactly what the banks, with half of their assets—some $5 trillion or one-third of the US economy—in off-balance-sheet derivatives, have become—a glorified casino that adds little or nothing to real economy, and also runs the risk of another global financial meltdown.

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