IMF Chief Lagarde Says Economic Outlook Is Dimming
International Monetary Fund Managing Director Christine Lagarde is raising alarm bells about the health of the global economy, saying international growth may have plateaued.
“For most countries, it has become more difficult to deliver on the promise of greater prosperity, because the global economic weather is beginning to change,” Ms. Lagarde said in a speech in Washington on Monday.
.. While other emerging-market currencies, from Indonesia’s to South Africa’s, have also experienced difficult declines this year, most emerging markets have avoided the acute turmoil of Turkey and Argentina.
If the crisis spreads, as some fear, capital could flood out of emerging markets, Ms. Lagarde warned, saying that IMF economists had estimated emerging markets could face up to $100 billion in portfolio outflows. In recent years, about $240 billion per year had flowed into those countries, so a $100 billion outflow would be a dramatic reversal.
.. Ms. Lagarde said another mounting concern is that threats to impose new trade restrictions have been carried out in a number of countries.
“A key issue is that rhetoric is morphing into a new reality of actual trade barriers,” Ms. Lagarde said. “This is hurting not only trade itself, but also investment and manufacturing as uncertainty continues to rise.”
.. countries have continued to pile on debt, which has tended to foretell slower growth in years ahead as the burden of debt service mounts. The total debt of the private sector has reached an “all-time high of $182 trillion,” Ms. Lagarde said, noting that the figure was 60% higher than in 2007.