The global economic crisis

By United Nations Conference on Trade and Development. Task Force on Systemic Issues and Economic Cooperation

Subjects: Global Financial Crisis, 2008-2009, Capital movements, Deregulation, Financial crises, International finance, Foreign exchange administration, Money market, Financial services industry, Commodity futures, Speculation

Description: This report investigates three specific areas in which the global economy experienced systemic failure. These are interrelated issues of importance to developed and developing countries alike. The report proposes measures to address the systemic failures they have entailed: (a) how the ideology of financial deregulation within and across nations allowed the build-up of pressures whose unwinding has damaged the credibility and functioning of the market-based models that have underpinned financial development throughout the world; (b) how the growing role of large-scale financial investors on commodities futures markets has affected commodity price volatility and fed speculative bubbles; and (c) the role of widespread currency speculation in exacerbating global imbalances and fuelling the current crisis in the absence of a cooperative international system to manage exchange rate fluctuations to the benefit of all nations.