Sudip Bandyopadhyay’s Blog

“Freedom!” is a perennial rallying cry, but “free markets!” never had the same ring to it, even in years where the record of free markets looked impressive. This has not been one of those years. So was 2008 the year that capitalism died? And if not, is 2009 the year that we should put capitalism [...]

Diversify. That was the mantra investors heard in recent years. Investing in a range of assets was supposed to improve overall returns as these were uncorrelated bets.
This year world stock markets lost almost $ 30,000 bn in value. Oil prices fell by two-thirds. House prices dropped. Bonds – except for government [...]

At the G20summit last month it was agreed that global growth will require sound new global regulation of financial markets. But what would it take to achieve such regulation? We argue that nothing less than a new global architecture for the regulation of banking and finance is required to ensure success. [...]

Once upon a time – six months ago, another age – anyone who could say “crack spread” without laughing was assured a lucrative job as an oil trader. Back then, when crude oil trading at $140 a barrel, the world looked Malthusian. The globe was threatened by a violent scramble for scarce resources, [...]

With the recent sharp decline in Chinese manufacturing output, the global decoupling theory seems to have died a well-deserved death.  The idea that developing countries had become less dependent on US economic conditions, and so were insulated from the US crisis, was based on a potent combination of bad analysis and wishful thinking.  In fact [...]