Tuesday, September 30, 2008

Next Tuesday's RBA board meeting will be very interesting

Macquarie's Rory Robertson is taking up the case for synchronised global rate cuts.

He writes:

**It was observed here last week that despite growing global financial turmoil, "large cuts in policy rates by key central banks have remained conspicuously absent. ...in not cutting rates - the policy action most households and businesses most understand - in recent months, the Fed, the BOE, the ECB and others have been fighting the developing crisis with 'one hand tied behind their backs'"

**After the Monday's sharp US market declines - now in the process of spinning around global markets in Tuesday's sessions - the case for large synchronised global rate cuts seems strong. Indeed, the case for large synchronised global rate cuts is stronger than ever before, and little else seems available at present to slow the "adverse feedback loop" threatening to stall the global economy, or worse.

**Whether synchronised global rate cuts will happen or not, I do not know. On the positive side, one suspects that the ECB, the BOE and other central banks now have, like Dallas Fed President Fisher, come belatedly to the conclusion that "inflation" no longer is the main threat to their economy's long-run health."