28 de Desembre de 2008

Són els incentius, estúpid!

Un article interessant a http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/28/business/economy/28view.html?_r=1&partner=permalink&exprod=permalink

Because Long-Term Capital owed large sums to banks and other financial institutions, the Federal Reserve Bank of New York organized a consortium of companies to buy it out and cover the debts. Alan Greenspan, then the Fed chairman, eased monetary policy to restart capital markets, which were starting to freeze up. Long-Term Capital's shareholders were wiped out, but none of the creditors took losses.

At the time, it may have seemed that regulators did the right thing. The bailout did not require upfront money from the government, and the world avoided an even bigger financial crisis. Today, however, that ad hoc intervention by the government no longer looks so wise. With the Long-Term Capital bailout as a precedent, creditors came to believe that their loans to unsound financial institutions would be made good by the Fed - as long as the collapse of those institutions would threaten the global credit system. Bolstered by this sense of security, bad loans mushroomed.

L'incentiu va ser protegir els creditors, en aquest cas els grans bancs, i això va crear el gran desastre: assegurats que el govern no els deixaria fer fallida, els grans bancs van donar crèdits a tort i a dret. Són els incentius, estúpid!

I ara els polítics encara volen regular més ...