ECONTALKS–UCC School of Economics Public Talks series 2015-16

There are a lot of topics worth discussing but have not had a proper airing on this site. They include
The 2016 Budget and the role of IFAC
The pressure on NAMA to wind up early and the attempt to turn it into a house builder
The Banking Inquiry, including the previously unheard views of the Central Bank, notably from those below the top level.
The decision to convert part of AIB’s Preference shares into equity and the strange price of AIB shares
The surge in Irish GDP
The extraordinary overshoot in Irish tax receipts, particularly from Corporation tax.
The IBRC Inquiry
The EU response to a widespread ignoring of SGP ‘rules’
The probable end of zero rates in the US
The ECB’s options on further QE and/or a further reduction in interest rates
The possibility of rent controls and their impact.
The ESRI’s research on Brexit.

@Dan

You should also add in the banks Mortgage Debt crisis.

I listened to Alan Dukes last might indicate that in his view Mortgage Debts is the one area of the banking disaster which still remains entirely unresolved – hence Noonan’s severe dislike to any sort of rental control as it simply has to dampen the growth rate in both rents and house prices.

A slowing or no growth house price market is the polar opposite of what the banks and their owners aka The Govt want to hear as this will eventually lead to real decisions to be taken regarding write offs to Mortgage debt.

@Dan

Agreed. A question for you …

Which is more powerful, in your opinion: the financial system or the political system?

@Seamus

I hear that Apple is now a Cork Company; great day for the self-sustaining independent Republic of Cork: the Irish Barcelona!

@Irish Citizenry

Your supine generosity is ABCD. The Vulture Funds send their warmest regards!

@Yobbo

“A slowing or no growth house price market is the polar opposite of what the banks and their owners aka The Govt want to hear as this will eventually lead to real decisions to be taken regarding write offs to Mortgage debt.”

…and the price of both residentially zoned farmland and ‘ordinary’ agricultural land adjacent it…

With super-low interest rates, and CAP payments, there is little urgency to do other than hold out for would-be builders to pay-up to buy it. The ‘land price’ element of squeezed ‘starter home’ prices might be regarded as an extravagance whereas the ‘plasterboard price’ element is more of a necessity.

Nama has now offloaded a lot of stuff and the Irish Banking is no longer regarded as a joke amongst investors.

I wonder how long before one of the Republican candidates highlights Ireland’s economic success and makes it a factor in the economic debate there. I’d say Donald Trump is the most likely to do it first, although Irish-American Paul Ryan might have done so already had he been a candidate. One thing’s for sure: Bernie Sanders won’t be bringing it up.

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/ireland-is-making-paul-krugman-eat-crow-2015-11-11

@grumpy

Good newz on investor ‘confidence’ in local Irish banks.

Bit more to financial system influence around here though…

http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2015/11/how-ireland-became-an-offshore-financial-center.html

… as it feeds into and essentially, imho, controls the political apparati of state; hence, the citizenry. Sorry old state …

Klaus Regling with a contribution which tells it as it is.

http://www.europarl.europa.eu/news/en/news-room/content/20151110STO01803/html/ESM-Managing-Director-on-Greece-There-is-no-need-for-a-nominal-haircut

Modern fire brigades typically refrain from mugging the householder.

Arguments about the technicalities of the ECB are pretty small beer in comparison with the events in Paris tonight. These are likely to have far more dramatic political repercussions than anything to do with how the Eurozone works. Almost certainly there will be a shift to the right in much of Europe. The cultural marxists who have ruled much of Western Europe for decades are completely discredited. Cultural marxism as a mass movement in Europe began in Paris in 1968 and it looks like its meeting its demise in Paris in 2015. Although they are not without fault, in the eyes of many continental Europeans the more conservative political leadership in Eastern European countries like Hungary and Poland are being vindicated. Merkel’s plan to import a million immigrants annually from Syria now looks utterly crazy, as do those Dublin 4 liberals who whined that Ireland wasn’t taking in the same number pro rata as Germany. I can’t see Ms Merkel being around for much longer. Ireland is lucky to have one of the smallest populations from North Africa, the Middle East and the Indian subcontinent in Western Europe. It should be Irish government policy to keep it like that, even if the need to grovel to the liberal and media elites prevents them from saying so publicly.