Asian shares up, betting on Italy and Mario Monti
by Paul Hong
Hong Kong is up by 2.4 per cent, Tokyo by 1.21 and Seoul by 2.11. The appointment of a new Italian prime minister is the cause, analysts say. Many believe he will bring Italy’s and Europe’s sovereign debt crisis under control. However, some wonder if the “seizure” of national sovereignty will lead to a world government under international finance.
Hong Kong (AsiaNews) – Asian shares are up after weeks of decline or stagnation. Analysts believe the change is due to reassuring news from Italy following the appointment of Mario Monti as the country’s new prime minister, and the belief that he can contribute to solving Italy’s and the Euro’s crises. However, in Italy, not everyone is happy about the appointment, concerned that it represents a “seizure” of national sovereignty in favour of the European Central Bank (ECB).
Hong Kong shares rose 2.40 per cent by the end of the morning session on Monday. In Tokyo, stocks rose 1.21 per cent, whilst in Seoul, the Korea Composite Stock Price Index (KOSPI) jumped by 2.11 per cent.
Everyone agrees that the positive signals are a response to a less pessimistic assessment of the Euro crisis and the sovereign debt problem in the eurozone.
However, Italy’s deficit represented 4.6 per cent of gross domestic product last year, similar to that of Germany and less than that of France, 7.1 per cent, and the UK, 10.3 per cent.
Italian banks are also in good health and have passed several European tests. Italians are also one the eurozone’s biggest savers. However, Italian government securities were targeted, reducing their value.
“Italy has a potentially high economic performance, yet it needs huge efforts to unleash it in a structural and permanent fashion,” EU President Herman Van Rompuy said.
In order to reduce Italy’s sovereign debt, the ECB imposed Mario Monti at the helm of a “technical” government to implement necessary reforms and cuts to avoid the country’s (and the Euro’s) bankruptcy.
Mario Monti, 68, a Yale University graduate, was an adviser to Goldman Sachs and a European commissioner. Currently, he is the president of Milan’s Bocconi University.
The decision by Italian President Giorgio Napolitano to appoint him as prime minister was met with satisfaction by the ECB and the International Monetary Fund.
However, many in Italy are asking why the BCE should have such a large sway in Italian politics and wondering whether its action amounts to a surrender of national sovereignty.
A month ago, economist Maurizio d’Orlando note in AsiaNews that the Italian crisis was manufactured (see Maurizio d’Orlando, “Moody’s, instability and the world’s single currency,” AsiaNews, 7 October 2011) in order to mess up the world, and “force a single central bank upon the world’s nations, controlled by same world financial interests who monopolise the derivatives market,” i.e. “the same people” who are “responsible for the recent derivatives bubble.”
Other agree. Writing in Corrispondenza romana, Prof Roberto de Mattei, said, “The undeclared goal of the ECB is the liquidation of nation-states. Presented as an economic necessity, the European Union is a clear ideological choice. It does not entail the birth of a strong European state, but rather a polycentric and chaos-ridden non-state, with many decision-making centres with complex and contradictory tasks. We are confronted with a shift of power not towards a single institution but towards a plurality of international institutions, whose jurisdictions are voluntarily unclear. This situation is characterised by a great confusion and latent or manifest tendency towards a conflict of powers. [. . .] with such a lack of sovereignty,” the situation “would lead to a supreme world authority. In a speech given in New York on 26 April 2010 to the Council of Foreign Relations, former ECB president Trichet explicitly mentioned the need and urgency for a super world government that sets the economic and financial rules to face the gloomy prospect of economic depression.”
Hong Kong shares rose 2.40 per cent by the end of the morning session on Monday. In Tokyo, stocks rose 1.21 per cent, whilst in Seoul, the Korea Composite Stock Price Index (KOSPI) jumped by 2.11 per cent.
Everyone agrees that the positive signals are a response to a less pessimistic assessment of the Euro crisis and the sovereign debt problem in the eurozone.
However, Italy’s deficit represented 4.6 per cent of gross domestic product last year, similar to that of Germany and less than that of France, 7.1 per cent, and the UK, 10.3 per cent.
Italian banks are also in good health and have passed several European tests. Italians are also one the eurozone’s biggest savers. However, Italian government securities were targeted, reducing their value.
“Italy has a potentially high economic performance, yet it needs huge efforts to unleash it in a structural and permanent fashion,” EU President Herman Van Rompuy said.
In order to reduce Italy’s sovereign debt, the ECB imposed Mario Monti at the helm of a “technical” government to implement necessary reforms and cuts to avoid the country’s (and the Euro’s) bankruptcy.
Mario Monti, 68, a Yale University graduate, was an adviser to Goldman Sachs and a European commissioner. Currently, he is the president of Milan’s Bocconi University.
The decision by Italian President Giorgio Napolitano to appoint him as prime minister was met with satisfaction by the ECB and the International Monetary Fund.
However, many in Italy are asking why the BCE should have such a large sway in Italian politics and wondering whether its action amounts to a surrender of national sovereignty.
A month ago, economist Maurizio d’Orlando note in AsiaNews that the Italian crisis was manufactured (see Maurizio d’Orlando, “Moody’s, instability and the world’s single currency,” AsiaNews, 7 October 2011) in order to mess up the world, and “force a single central bank upon the world’s nations, controlled by same world financial interests who monopolise the derivatives market,” i.e. “the same people” who are “responsible for the recent derivatives bubble.”
Other agree. Writing in Corrispondenza romana, Prof Roberto de Mattei, said, “The undeclared goal of the ECB is the liquidation of nation-states. Presented as an economic necessity, the European Union is a clear ideological choice. It does not entail the birth of a strong European state, but rather a polycentric and chaos-ridden non-state, with many decision-making centres with complex and contradictory tasks. We are confronted with a shift of power not towards a single institution but towards a plurality of international institutions, whose jurisdictions are voluntarily unclear. This situation is characterised by a great confusion and latent or manifest tendency towards a conflict of powers. [. . .] with such a lack of sovereignty,” the situation “would lead to a supreme world authority. In a speech given in New York on 26 April 2010 to the Council of Foreign Relations, former ECB president Trichet explicitly mentioned the need and urgency for a super world government that sets the economic and financial rules to face the gloomy prospect of economic depression.”
.png)
See also
