Krzysztof Bledowski, Ph.D.
Krzysztof Bledowski, Ph.D. |
06/18/2013 |
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Our manufacturing outlook for Europe has been revised downward. The uneven recession in the Eurozone is now coupled with a downturn in the Czech Republic and sharply falling economic activity in Poland. Domestic demand continues to soften. Businesses refrain from adding to capacity despite low cost of capital, gripped by political and institutional uncertainty. A possible governance crisis also weighs on consumer spending, which fell in the last...
Krzysztof Bledowski, Ph.D. |
06/05/2013 |
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Our semiannual council meetings constitute the backbone of MAPI’s smorgasbord of value. These workshops are unique in the marketplace of continuing education. That’s because aside from being largely peer-driven, they cut across the lines of technology, corporate size, culture, and geography. When such a wide body of knowledge is up for the taking, the pickings are bound to be rich. But how do members see this?
Some time ago I started to quantify...
Categories: Council Operations, Executive Management, Operational Improvement
Krzysztof Bledowski, Ph.D. |
05/14/2013 |
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Things are not moving up in Europe’s economic tables.
Income and employment continue to sag amid languishing business sentiment, unfinished recovery of the financial sector, and continued political malaise. The euro area’s GDP will finish 2013 down about ½ percent on the year before. The ECB’s recent interest rate cut is helpful but unlikely to gain much traction. That’s because the private sector isn’t in the mood to add or refinance debt. In...
Krzysztof Bledowski, Ph.D. |
03/22/2013 |
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Europe is struggling, again.
Cypriot banks are effectively insolvent and need about €17 bn (possibly more) to recover. The IMF can lend at most €10 bn because a higher amount would tip the country’s total debt to GDP ratio beyond sustainable levels (generally 110-120 percent of GDP). So, the missing €6-7 bn must come from sources that bypass fiscal accounts.
I expect that the depositors’ bail-in will be reworked to exclude accounts under the...
Krzysztof Bledowski, Ph.D. |
03/01/2013 |
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There is a whiff of big dollars and big euros in the air of Washington and Brussels these days. And no, it’s not about the sequester or the Eurozone debts imploding. It’s about the European Union and the United States getting serious about signing on to a transatlantic free trade agreement (TAFTA). If fully implemented, TAFTA stands to inject hundreds of billions of euros and dollars into their respective economies per year.
I attended a few...
Krzysztof Bledowski, Ph.D. |
01/24/2013 |
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European manufacturing is on a steep retrenchment course. It all started, paradoxically, just as financial markets stabilized in the wake of the European Central Bank’s “whatever-it-takes” moment this past summer. Since August, industrial production shed a total of about 3.5 percent in just three months in the Eurozone and further declines are in the offing. From Poland’s recent domestic release the news comes even bleaker: the country, which...
Categories: Economic Growth, Europe - Central, Europe - Eastern, Eurozone
Krzysztof Bledowski, Ph.D. |
01/03/2013 |
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Europe muddled through the crisis in 2012 without advancing much toward its lasting resolution. The high point came mid-year (the “July moment”) when Mario Draghi, the ECB president, vowed to “do whatever it takes” to defend the euro. The markets calmed but national politicians struggled to find common ground around building a closer union. And the outlook for 2013 does not bode well. Amid a continuing recession and under the weight of fiscal...
Krzysztof Bledowski, Ph.D. |
12/17/2012 |
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“Transatlantic free trade” is back on the agenda.
The EU recently sent out feelers about being ready to open up serious negotiations on a free trade agreement with the United States. Previous attempts in 1995 and then in 2007 fizzled out early. So why is the EU putting a failed idea back on the table?
There are some plausible explanations. For one, many in Europe worry about the U.S. “pivoting” across the Pacific and away from the Atlantic when...
Categories: U.S. Manufacturing
Krzysztof Bledowski, Ph.D. |
11/20/2012 |
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The near-term horizon for Europe looks cloudy.
Economic growth has slowed to a crawl across the EU and started falling in the Eurozone in the third quarter. Some countries have been mired in a recession for over a year, including Spain, Italy, and Portugal. Even central Europe has not been spared: GDP fell for four consecutive quarters in the Czech Republic and for three in Hungary. With German domestic demand softening as well, it is a matter...
Categories: Economic Analysis, Economic Growth, Eurozone, IMF
Krzysztof Bledowski, Ph.D. |
09/18/2012 |
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German voters are getting more Eurosceptic and Germany's politicians are slowly getting the message. The country's policies face limits to sovereignty imposed by the EU that are foreign to the U.S. Therein lies the crux of Germany's (and Europe's) current malaise: domestic electorates embrace the EU and Europe only as auxiliary political and economic constructs. All the same, they (the electorates) are not ready (yet) to submit to higher...
Categories: Europe - Central, Eurozone
Krzysztof Bledowski, Ph.D. |
05/25/2012 |
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European leaders are waking up to a different type of “troika” emerging: the specter of Greece defaulting on its debt, disintegrating in a political vacuum, and ditching the euro.
The recent EU summit yielded little concrete in policy measures. The markets could have taken solace from moves toward single insurance schemes for banks’ liabilities, from a push toward centralized revenue and spending authority, or from clear commitment toward...
Categories: Eurozone, Finance, IMF, United States
Krzysztof Bledowski, Ph.D. |
02/16/2012 |
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It’s official: fourth quarter data have confirmed that Europe’s economy is headed south faster than expected. Both the GDP and industrial statistics paint a picture of a sharp downturn that has already turned into double-dip recessions in about half a dozen countries.
Industrial statistics surprised on the downside. Eurozone’s total production slumped 2 percent in December when compared to the previous December – a dramatic turnaround from...
Categories: SEC