\t27 d\u00e9cembre 2007 L’ann\u00e9e finit en g\u00e9n\u00e9ral sur une note brouill\u00e9e lorsqu’il s’agit d’envisager l’\u00e9volution de la structure financi\u00e8re du monde. Le traditionnel optimisme des f\u00eates a du mal \u00e0 s’exprimer spontan\u00e9ment. La crise veille, on parle de celle du syst\u00e8me financier, bancaire, de cr\u00e9dit, etc. Surtout, elle est tapie au fond des psychologies. Les analyses de la situation sont en g\u00e9n\u00e9ral maussades \u00e0 tr\u00e8s pessimistes. Lorsque l’analyse s’\u00e9largit \u00e0 l’enqu\u00eate, le pessimisme tr\u00e8s noir domine et s’avance jusqu’\u00e0 l’apocalyptique.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
\tC’est le cas d’une longue analyse de Ambrose Evans-Pritchard le 23 d\u00e9cembre<\/a> dans le Daily Telegraph<\/em>. Evans-Pritchard est un analyste \u00e9conomique renomm\u00e9 de la presse britannique. Nous allons emprunter \u00e0 son long texte quelques extraits illustrant ce qu’il juge \u00eatre la gravit\u00e9 de la situation d’une part (notamment au travers de citations de sp\u00e9cialistes qu’il a rencontr\u00e9s ou lus), l’impuissance o\u00f9 se trouvent les uns et les autres devant l’\u00e9volution de la situation d’autre part. Il nous semble que deux faits apparaissent:<\/p>\n<\/p>\n \t Les d\u00e9saccords sur les causes de la crise, donc sur les mesures \u00e0 prendre, comme si l’on se trouvait devant une machine hors de notre contr\u00f4le et, plus encore, hors de notre comp\u00e9tence et de notre perception, une machine qui n’appartient plus \u00e0 notre monde. Par cons\u00e9quent, les solutions propos\u00e9es ressortent de la r\u00e9p\u00e9tition des vieilles recettes et de l’incantation.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n \t La prudence, voire la pusillanimit\u00e9 des autorit\u00e9s mises en place depuis les crises de l’entre-deux-Guerres pour emp\u00eacher justement cette perte de contr\u00f4le. Il y a le sentiment de l’impuissance et, par cons\u00e9quent, des r\u00e9ponses au coup par coup, le plus souvent selon l’adage du trop peu trop tard, donc avec des effets extr\u00eamement r\u00e9duits sur le court terme, qui peuvent soudainement devenir brutalement d\u00e9favorables par l’incertitude psychologique qu’ils refl\u00e8tent et entra\u00eener un processus d’effondrement. Nous engloberions ces attitudes diverses sous un terme: d\u00e9sarroi<\/strong>, pour d\u00e9finir l’attitude des autorit\u00e9s veillant au bon fonctionnement de l’\u00e9conomie.. <\/p>\n<\/p>\n \tVoici quelques extraits du texte de Evans-Pritchard. Nous ne cachons pas que nous avons choisi les plus cr\u00e9pusculaires mais nous pr\u00e9cisons aussit\u00f4t que le choix s’est aussi impos\u00e9 \u00e0 nous parce que c’est \u00e0 peu pr\u00e8s la couleur g\u00e9n\u00e9rale du texte de Evans-Pritchard.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n \t\u00abTwenty billion dollars here, $20bn there, and a lush half-trillion from the European Central Bank at give-away rates for Christmas. Buckets of liquidity are being splashed over the North Atlantic banking system, so far with meagre or fleeting effects.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p>\n \t\u00bbAs the credit paralysis stretches through its fifth month, a chorus of economists has begun to warn that the world’s central banks are fighting the wrong war, and perhaps risk a policy error of epochal proportions.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p>\n \t\u00bbLiquidity doesn’t do anything in this situation, says Anna Schwartz, the doyenne of US monetarism and life-time student (with Milton Friedman) of the Great Depression.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p>\n \t\u00bbIt cannot deal with the underlying fear that lots of firms are going bankrupt. The banks and the hedge funds have not fully acknowledged who is in trouble. That is the critical issue, she adds.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p>\n \t()<\/p>\n<\/p>\n \t\u00bbYork professor Peter Spencer, chief economist for the ITEM Club, says the global authorities have just weeks to get this right, or trigger disaster.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p>\n \t\u00bbThe central banks are rapidly losing control. By not cutting interest rates nearly far enough or fast enough, they are allowing the money markets to dictate policy. We are long past worrying about moral hazard, he says.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p>\n \t\u00bbThey still have another couple of months before this starts imploding. Things are very unstable and can move incredibly fast. I don’t think the central banks are going to make a major policy error, but if they do, this could make 1929 look like a walk in the park, he adds.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p>\n \t(…)<\/p>\n<\/p>\n \t\u00bbNew York’s Federal Reserve chief Tim Geithner echoed the words, warning of an adverse self-reinforcing dynamic, banker-speak for a downward spiral. The Fed has broken decades of practice by inviting all US depositary banks to its lending window, bringing dodgy mortgage securities as collateral.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p>\n \t\u00bbQuietly, insiders are perusing an obscure paper by Fed staffers David Small and Jim Clouse. It explores what can be done under the Federal Reserve Act when all else fails.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p>\n \t\u00bbSection 13 (3) allows the Fed to take emergency action when banks become unwilling or very reluctant to provide credit. A vote by five governors can in exigent circumstances authorise the bank to lend money to anybody, and take upon itself the credit risk. This clause has not been evoked since the Slump.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p>\n \t()<\/p>\n<\/p>\n \t\u00bbBernard Connolly, global strategist at Banque AIG, said the Fed and allies had scripted a Greek tragedy by under-pricing credit long ago and seem paralysed as post-bubble chickens now come home to roost. The central banks are trying to dissociate financial problems from the real economy. They are pushing the world nearer and nearer to the edge of depression. We hope they will eventually be dragged kicking and screaming to do enough, but time is running out, he said.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p>\n \t()<\/p>\n<\/p>\n \t\u00bbThe kind of upheaval observed in the international money markets over the past few months has never been witnessed in history, says Thomas Jordan, a Swiss central bank governor.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p>\n \t\u00bbThe sub-prime mortgage crisis hit a vital nerve of the international financial system, he says.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p>\n \t()<\/p>\n<\/p>\n \t\u00bbCitigroup, Merrill Lynch, UBS, HSBC and others have stepped forward to reveal their losses. At some point, enough of the dirty linen will be on the line to let markets discern the shape of the debacle. We are not there yet.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p>\n \t\u00bbGoldman Sachs caused shock last month when it predicted that total crunch losses would reach $500bn, leading to a $2 trillion contraction in lending as bank multiples kick into reverse. This already seems humdrum.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p>\n \t\u00bbOur counterparties are telling us that losses may reach $700bn, says Rob McAdie, head of credit at Barclays Capital. Where will it end? The big banks face a further $200bn of defaults in commercial property. On it goes.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p>\n \t\u00bbThe International Monetary Fund still predicts blistering global growth of 5 per cent next year. If so, markets should roar back to life in January, as though the crunch were but a nightmare. There again, the credit souffl\u00e9 may be hard to raise a second time.<\/em>\u00bb<\/p>\n<\/p>\n