Main focus of Tuesday, September 15, 2009

A year of crisis

One year after the bankruptcy of US investment bank Lehman Brothers plunged the world into the worst financial and economic crisis of the postwar era, the European press comments on the mistakes of the past, the state of the economy and hopes for the future.

De Volkskrant - Netherlands

A year after the begin of the financial crisis the lessons to be learned are still not clear for governments, the left-liberal daily De Volkskrant writes: "The positive role the public sector obviously played in the rescuing of the banking system has not led to greater clarity on its function. True, governments are suddenly owners of banks, insurance companies and car manufacturers, but this has not led to new ideological insights. … Under no circumstances can governments afford to save the financial sector again. Unfortanately it seems most of this sector has simply returned to business as usual. Moreover, despite a general consensus [that reform is necessary] the governments appear to be anything but in agreement when it comes to working out the details. So we'll have to wait for the G20 summit at the end of September to see if bankers' bonuses are to be tackled effectively. … If they aren't or the job isn't done properly the pessimists who believe another downturn is necessary to really overcome the crisis will be proven right." (15/09/2009)

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More from the press review on the subject » Fiscal Policy, » Global

Correio da Manhã - Portugal

A year after the Lehman bankruptcy the world seems to have learned nothing from the crisis, the daily Correio da Manhã concludes: "After all the panic and the injection of astronomic sums of taxpayers' money into rescuing banks it seems little has been learned. Yesterday [Monday] [US President] Barack Obama called for more transparency, more regulation and more supervision in the financial system. If nothing is done the taxpayers will be the ones to pay the price for saving institutions whose managers are only concerned about their bonus millions and will therefore go to any lengths to inflate the profits, even if it means cooking the books." (15/09/2009)

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More from the press review on the subject » Fiscal Policy, » U.S., » Global
All available articles from » Armando Esteves Pereira

Frankfurter Rundschau - Germany

The bankruptcy of US investment bank Lehman Brothers wasn't what plunged the world into the crisis. The problem was liberalised financial markets and low-consumption countries like Germany, writes the left-liberal Frankfurter Rundschau: "The thesis that Germany was solidly positioned and thus slipped into the crisis through no fault of its own is the third Lehman lie. A glance at the real economy makes that clear. In the past decade the global economy grew primarily because America could consume more than it produced. This growth was financed by almost worthless securities bought by countries that produced more than they consumed, with China, Germany and Japan at the top of the list. As long as these countries don't fill the global gap in demand with higher consumption, the global economy will not see sustainable recovery. Permanent export surpluses of the kind targeted by the German economy are just as responsible for the crisis as their counterpart, the permanent trade deficits in Anglo-Saxon countries." (15/09/2009)

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More from the press review on the subject » International Relations, » Fiscal Policy, » Economic Policy, » Financial Markets, » Banks, » Germany, » U.S., » Global
All available articles from » Robert von Heusinger

Les Echos - France

One year after the Lehman Brothers bankruptcy the business daily Les Echos compares two momentous September days: "September 15, 2008 will no doubt long remain the worst bank insolvency in history. On that day Lehman Brothers disappeared from the horizon on Wall Street with the same speed as the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center disappeared from the Manhattan skyline seven years earlier. Within a few hours on September 11, 2001 the airplanes stopped flying one after another. This time around it was the banks that all at once stopped lending. A large sign with the words 'Closed due to general mistrust' went up at all the counters of the global capital market. Of course globalisation is the link between these two very different events, both of which clearly demonstrate its strength, but also its weaknesses." (15/09/2009)

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More from the press review on the subject » Banks, » Global
All available articles from » Henri Gibier

Cinco Días - Spain

A year after the Lehman Brothers bankruptcy the EU countries seem to have come through the worst of the crisis. But Spain mustn't allow itself to lag behind, the business paper Cinco Días writes: "According to Brussels the good news about the rapid recovery of the European Union club stands in contrast to the elongated shadow of recession looming over Spain's economy. Spain is still stuck and will be the only major economy in the EU not to move out of recession in 2009. To move on and catch up with the rest even while internal demand remains low owing to the galloping unemployment figures it must improve its competitiveness and boost exports. … It's true that Spain is not dependent on itself alone, but the economies of our best customers, Germany and France, are recovering. The goal now is to regenerate Spain's export potential and take advantage of the stimulus the demand from these countries provides." (15/09/2009)

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More from the press review on the subject » Fiscal Policy, » Economic Policy, » Financial Markets, » Germany, » France, » Spain, » Europe

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