Skip navigation


Current DateTime: 01:18:05 09 Feb 2012
LinksList Documentid: 24355697

Current DateTime: 01:18:05 09 Feb 2012
LinksList Documentid: 23452764
Expiration DateTime: 2/9/2012 1:21:24 PM

MOST SHARED


Current DateTime: 01:18:06 09 Feb 2012
LinksList Documentid: 31330905
Expiration DateTime: 2/9/2012 1:21:45 PM

MOST POPULAR


Current DateTime: 01:18:07 09 Feb 2012
LinksList Documentid: 35819650
    • Road Warriors

        All the gadgets and gear a savvy frequent traveler needs to navigate the global economy.

HOT ON FACEBOOK

America Is 'Bankrupt Mickey Mouse Economy': CIO

Published: Wednesday, 11 Aug 2010 | 9:25 AM ET
Text Size
By: Patrick Allen
CNBC EMEA Head of News

America is a "Mickey Mouse economy" that is technically bankrupt, according to Jochen Wermuth, the Chief Investment Officer (CIO) and managing partner at Wermuth Asset Management.

"America today looks like Russia in 1998. Consumers, companies and the government are all highly indebted. America as a result is a bankrupt Mickey Mouse economy," Wermuth told CNBC.

The comments followed news that the Fed was extending its quantitative easing program following what the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) described as a fall in the pace of growth in output and employment.

The Fed has spent the past three years on a route of aggressive rate cuts and purchases of trillions in various securities but it is running out of measures it can take, Pimco's co-CEO Mohamed El-Erian told CNBC.

Wermuth is a fund manager heavily invested in Russia and says if the same International Monetary Fund (IMF) team that managed the financial crisis in the former super power in 1998 now turned up at the US Treasury, they would withdraw support for current US policy immediately.

"The big evil for the IMF in Russia in 1998 was the prospect of the central bank funding government debt. The Fed is now even buying mortgage-backed securities," he noted.

"Even before the (Troubled Asset Relief Program) and the expansion of the Fed's balance sheet, total US public and private debt as a percentage of GDP in the US stood at 290 percent, that figure is now far higher," Wermuth added.

"US credit risk is huge and America has two options, either default or let the currency depreciate substantially against currencies such as the yuan and the rouble," he explained.

"Last night's news from the Fed simply creates the right conditions for dollar weakness and a reduction in US liabilities to foreign investors and governments," Wermuth said.

(CORRECTION: An earlier version of the story quoted Wermuth as saying total US government debt as a percentage of GDP was 290 percent. Wermuth said the ratio of total US public and private debt is 290 percent.)

© 2011 CNBC.com


Current DateTime: 11:43:35 09 Feb 2012
LinksList Documentid: 29778428

Current DateTime: 11:56:47 09 Feb 2012
LinksList Documentid: 29779196

Current DateTime: 10:44:46 09 Feb 2012
LinksList Documentid: 29779197

Current DateTime: 11:21:40 09 Feb 2012
LinksList Documentid: 29779199
CNBCCNBC
About CNBC  |  Site Map  |  Video Reprints   |  Advertise  |  Help  |  Contact
Privacy Policy  |     |  Terms of Service  |  Independent Programming Report
  Data is a real-time snapshot  *Data is delayed at least 15 minutes
Global Business and Financial News, Stock Quotes, and Market Data and Analysis

© 2012 CNBC LLC.  All Rights Reserved.
A Division of NBCUniversal
Thomson ReutersThomson Reuters