Portugal more or less declared bankruptcy yesterday. Here’s how the ECB responded today:
Worried about rising prices, the European Central Bank raised its benchmark interest rate for the first time since 2008 on Thursday, risking damage to weaker economies like Portugal, which only a day earlier became the third country to request an international bailout….The bank president, Jean-Claude Trichet, and other members of the governing council had warned repeatedly over the past month about the risk that higher oil prices would fuel a general increase in prices.
This is nuts. Inflation is a monetary phenomenon. Surging oil prices are a supply and demand phenomenon. Oil prices aren’t going up because there’s too much money in circulation, they’re going up because supply is limited, there’s unrest in the Middle East, and demand keeps rising inexorably upward.
I have some sympathy for bond hawks who say that although bond prices aren’t currently showing any fear of either inflation or financial collapse, markets can turn quickly and it’s best to keep from ever getting to the point when that turn might happen. Still, a little more inflation right now would be a good thing, not a bad one, and economic growth would be a really good thing. Anything that gets in the way of growth is just begging for bigger trouble down the road. This panicky action from Trichet is a big mistake.
