presentazione venerdì 13 maggio, Palazzo Panciatichi , Firenze

Il Presidente del Consiglio regionale della Toscana Eugenio Giani è lieto di invitare la S.V. alla presentazione del volume "Critica del monetarismo e dei derivati di credito" di Giorgio Bellucci venerdì 13 maggio 2016, ore 17.00 Sala Gigli, Palazzo Panciatichi via Cavour 4, Firenze Saranno presenti: Eugenio Giani Presidente del Consiglio regionale della Toscana Lucia De Robertis Vicepresidente del Consiglio regionale della Toscana Interventi Don Leonardo Salutati Docente di Teologia morale della Facoltà Teologica dell’Italia Centrale Filippo Zatti Prof. Associato di Diritto dell’Economia, Università di Firenze Giorgio Bellucci Autore del volume Danilo Barbi Segretario nazionale CGIL Coordina Dalida Angelini Segretario CGIL regionale

This crisis has neither mother nor father

The bubbles and the subsequent wealth effects which are their outcome - explains the economist - should be seen as the financial answer to both a growing inequality and a drop in consumption. A view which today shows its historical limitations. "Seven years after the onset of the crisis it is time to realize that the sequence of savings - investment - real economy flowing through the financial markets is not working". In times like these showing a considerable instability in the world's financial markets we have asked the economist Giorgio Bellucci, author of the book Critica del monetarismo e dei derivati di credito (published by Ediesse), to give us his views on the new financial options starting from the "big bubble" of 1929 up to the "Internet bubble" and to sub-prime loans. "The term of comparison generally used to describe what is seen by all as the worst post-war crisis -Bellucci remarks - is that of the great depression of 1929, which in the '30s totally upset all the given theories and heightened the differences of opinions expressed by the economists. Today nothing of this sort occurs. This crisis has neither mother nor father and there is no self-criticism but rather there is a general leveling out which appears to dominate both the interpretations of the crisis and the measures that have been taken." According to Bellucci, the current view is that the breakdown of the system was caused by the insolvency of sub-prime loans and, based on this interpretation of the crisis, measures were taken to counter the depression. Governments and central banks based their countermeasures for monetary policy on "monetary contraction". "But to link the start of the crisis to the insolvency of borrowers has meant - according to the author of Critica del monetarismo e dei derivati di credito -linking the crisis to the trends of taxation by the Federal Reserve and to the lack of controls concerning the credit capabilities of debtors". In order to give a clear picture of the situation Bellucci indicates some figures: interest rates in the United States rose from 1% in October 2003 to 5.25% in 2006; the Dow Jones index rose from 7,600 points in October 2002 to 14,000 in 2007; the volume of Credit default swaps (Cds) rose from 3,500 billion in 2003 to 58,000 billion in 2008; the notional amount of credit derivatives (on a global scale) rose from 278,000 billion in 2003 to 980,000 billion in 2008. The fact must not be overlooked that again in the United States, the securitization of loans given out in 2001 in the order of 62% rose in 2006 to 77%. This shows, says Bellucci, that securitization rises more than proportionally on loans and on rising rates just as Wall Street doubles on rising rates. "All of this - says the economist - goes on while at the same time the volume of Cds and credit derivatives goes out of control. The corollary lies in the probabilistic notion of the dispersion of risk. The bubbles cannot be foreseen but their bursting can be contained as was the case with the famous 'Greenspan put ' in the 90s. In such a dramatic plummeting of the stock markets Credit default swaps should be blocked and non standardized derivatives should be stopped for at least six months in Italy and in Europe". Today, according to Bellucci, we face a scene of total uncertainty for commentators and economists. To a view of the crisis as a "monetary contraction" there followed that of the monetary helicopter as suggested by Milton Friedman in his works and applied by the non conventional policies of the Fed and the ECB. "Rising inequality helps to explain the nature of the continuous stagnation of growth during the ongoing of the crisis: in the United States, over the last 30 years, 16% of the income of 95% of the population has passed to the remaining 5%; more or less the same thing as has occurred in Europe". The divide between income and consumption has been met by increasing indebtedness. "The financial bubbles, and the resulting wealth effects - concludes Bellucci - should be seen as the financial response to the rise in inequality and the drop in consumption. After seven years this response has by now shown its historical limitations and furthermore, it is a foreru