CALDEIRÃO DE BOLSA

Eu não sabia que o texto estava incompleto, de onde eu o retirei não constava a restante parte.

Ainda bem que colocaste o link com o artigo completo, pois o texto é todo ele deveras interessante.

Abraço e Obrigado!

Surfer, como essa transcrição não é a totalidade do artigo, dou-me à liberdade de deixar aqui um link para ele no National Post (Jornal do Canadá):

http://www.nationalpost.com/financialpo ... 370F716B29


Cump.

When economists talk about the U.S. current account deficit, they like to quote Herb Stein.
Mr. Stein, a distinguished economist and former chairman of the President's Council of Economic Advisers during the Nixon administration, said: "If something cannot go on forever, it will stop."

The comment was made in regard to the current account deficit of the early 1980s. And he was right then. The same quote could have been applied to the tech bubble and the rally in the U.S. dollar. And it will undoubtedly hold true for the recent bond market blowout.

But what will bring down today's current account deficit, the last major bubble of the current cycle? More importantly, can it be brought down gently?

Economists are increasingly unsure.

"Experience tells us typically these things end in tears and I think the U.S. is not going to voluntarily embark on a plan to raise savings," said Jim O'Neill, head of global economic research at Goldman Sachs in London. "Therefore, it will only come when it is forced on the U.S. It is possible in the next two to three years it could come to a dollar crisis."

History is indeed littered with the burnt-out shells of countries that have suffered current account meltdowns. Think of Latin America in the 1980s and Asia in the late 1990s.

The process is all too familiar. A country starts to grow at a torrid pace, this spurs consumption and borrowing and an influx of investment from abroad. The currency soars. Pretty soon the country is borrowing beyond its means and a great chasm opens up between domestic savings and investment.

Investors, fickle as they are, suddenly lose faith, turn tail and the currency and economy implode.

The United States is not an emerging market, of course, but its adjustment in the 1980s was sharp nonetheless.

The deficit reached a peak of 3.5% but a few short years later it had vanished, thanks to a recession, a 40% depreciation in the greenback and the rise of Japan Inc., which became the new investment destination of choice.

Today, the U.S. current account deficit sits at 5% of GDP but economists expect it to go higher still. That's because the U.S. economy, as weak as it is, has better prospects for recovery than most other regions, most notably Japan and Europe.

There was a flurry of excitement in Japan last week as the stock market soared and bond yields shot higher amid tentative signs of recovery but the economy is hardly about to rise Phoenix-like yet.

Japanese investors may be tempted to dump some of their U.S. treasury holdings for Japanese bonds but they're more likely to switch to U.S. equities instead.

The debt burden to fund the widening U.S. deficit, meanwhile, will become increasingly onerous, notes Martin Barnes, editor of the Bank Credit Analyst in Montreal.

At the end of last year, U.S. net external debt was estimated at US$2.8-trillion, or 26% of GDP. In three years, it will reach US$5-trillion, or 40% of GDP, if the current account trend doesn't change.

"As the debt rises, so will the net outflow of interest, profits and dividend payments to foreigners," Mr. Barnes said. "This boosts the current account deficit even more, threatening to unleash a vicious cycle of spiralling deficits and debt."

By: Jacqueline Thorpe