Talk:Global financial crisis of 2008–2009/Archive 1

Map is wrong

The map at the top says that Australia is in recession as of Dec 2008. I might not know much about economics, but I'm sure that's wrong. Needs fixing. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.217.47.227 (talk) 11:13, 31 December 2008 (UTC)

Sorry got that wrong.Pay no attention to me. 203.217.47.227 (talk) 11:16, 31 December 2008 (UTC)

Canada is also not yet in recession. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 209.47.136.2 (talk) 15:17, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Hi There,

The Map on this link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Recession_2008.png is incorrect as Greece and Cyprus's economies are both still growing

CYPRUS

http://www.cyprus-mail.com/news/ The Cypriot government expects a deficit of 0.8 per cent of GDP in 2009 compared to the expected surplus of 1.0 per cent for 2008. It also forecasts GDP growth at a low 2.1 per cent this year, which is expected to rebound to 2.4 per cent in 2010 and 3.0 per cent in 2011. Figures released last week put 2008 growth at 3.8 per cent. ( These are not even in the pink zone)

GREECE

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Late_2000s_recession_in_Europe Industrial output in both Italy and Greece has slumped 6.6 percent over the past year. However, Greece's economy will continue to grow for both 2008 and 2009; Eurostat expects the Greek economy to grow 3.1% and 2.5% respectively. However Greece faces a very big challenge with its public finances because of the crisis ( This is from Wiki's own Recession 2009 thread.

Please can you amend this when you get a chance —Preceding unsigned comment added by 90.192.29.185 (talk) 14:23, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Notability

Is this even notable? It can surely be tagged on to another article somewhere. Merely 1 pararaph doesn't equate to viability as an article of its own.

Maybe economic depression can have a sub section. Lihaas (talk) 03:41, 20 September 2008 (UTC)

This event (if true as stated by the article) is apparently of global importance, and as seen in its citations, has been covered by major news sources to some degree.

The article of course has other issues not connected to notability. The title "stock market crash" is an overt exaggeration (especially since the world economy has been in trouble for much of this year), and thus doesn't fare well against WP:NPOV or more specifically WP:RECENT. I have tagged it for merging into Economic crisis of 2008 as I think the facts here should be placed into greater perspective. ~ Jafet • business • pleasure • voicemail 05:33, 20 September 2008 (UTC)

The article currently is too small, hence it's a stub, but that's temporary. It needs some serious expanding. Certainly the fact you had countries around the world outright banning short-selling, investigations being launched, central banks all over the world pouring money into the markets, some markets halting all trade, markets all over the world falling 10% in one day or in two or three days makes it of sufficient significance to have a stand-alone article. There's an article for the problems in January which weren't nearly as serious. As far as calling it a crash, several markets did crash by any account.--The Devil's Advocate (talk) 06:30, 20 September 2008 (UTC)

The events of the week of September 15, and the proposed bailout are certainly notable. Currently there is information here, at Subprime mortgage crisis and at Financial crisis of 2007-2008. In coverage by the Wall Street Journal the phrase "Black September" was used and in a c-span appearance by Wall Street Journal editorial board member Stephen Moore referred to the events as a "financial panic". However, I think both crash and panic should be saved for more dramatic events. Let's just wait and see how the events are spoken of in the media. Fred Talk 17:45, 20 September 2008 (UTC)

See this NYT's article on language Fred Talk 18:30, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

Not only that, but there is no mention of the immediate rebound of the markets on September 18th and 19th...I believe that if you talk about what has happened, you must refer to the aftermath as well, which includes the temporary ban on short-selling as well as the U.S. government's decision to create an institution similiar to the RTC from the S&L crisis. ThePacMan

Well, then why not add some material? No one's gonna stop you.--The Devil's Advocate (talk) 01:44, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

Merger with Financial crisis of 2007-2008

Resolved

 – I have retained Financial crisis of 2007-2008 in view of the emergence of the crisis in August, 2007, but transferred all the blow by blow to this renamed account. Initially this crisis had not assumed global proportions, but now it clearly has. Much editing remains to fully integrate the material from both articles. Fred Talk 14:27, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

I would strongly suggest a merger with Financial crisis of 2007-2008 (rather than with Economic crisis of 2008, a merger previously proposed).

The first paragraph of this article could be merged with the paragraph at Financial_crisis_of_2007-2008#Week_of_September_14.2C_2008 which begins "The beginning of the work week was marked by extreme instability in global stock markets..." I suggest the following text:

"The beginning of the work week was marked by extreme instability in global stock markets, with dramatic drops in market values on Monday, September 15, and Wednesday, September 17. The crash resulted in large infusions of cash by central banks around the world. On the first day, the Dow Jones Industrial Average plunged 504 points (4.4%) while the S&P 500 fell 59 points (4.7%). Asian and European markets rendered similarly sharp drops. United Kingdom regulators announced a temporary ban on short-selling of financial stocks on September 18 and were followed by the United States on September 19."

i.e. just append the last four sentences of the first paragraph from this article.

I have already copied across the section on "Response to crash". Along with the modification suggested above, that would absorb all of this article's content into the financial crisis article.

January 2008 stock market volatility is a previous example of an article created in the expectation that it would be chronicling a global market crash, only to have the event prove to be just one more fluctuation in the longer run. I think it unlikely that this month's stock market events warrant an article of their own; but they do warrant a paragraph or two in the article on the larger financial crisis of which they are a symptom. Mporter (talk) 07:20, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

There are plenty of details to show this clearly is suitable for an independent article. The bit about central banks was just a sample. Unfortunately it seems no one else really cares to build on this article at all.--The Devil's Advocate (talk) 05:42, 24 September 2008 (UTC)

There should not be a merger with Financial crisis of 2007-2008. This should be a comprehensive article, including all the blow by blow. That article, once events cool down, should be a summary of current events. Although this article is being neglected, when folks get around to writing it, there will be much more information and perspective available. Fred Talk 13:02, 26 September 2008 (UTC)

comment You are correct in worrying about the title, because this will not be over in September. That does not however negate a merger, it just means we should be trying to come up with a better title. NJGW (talk) 19:18, 28 September 2008 (UTC)

• Merge There's no harm in this topic becoming a section of the Financial crisis of 2007-2008, and it would cause the section to grow sufficiently to warrant a stand-alone article, since there are more eyes on the Financial crisis article. Proliferation of articles is impairing improvement of all of these related topics. -- Yellowdesk (talk) 13:51, 26 September 2008 (UTC)
• Merge Financial crisis of 2007-2008 is all about that the topic discussed at this article. The Economic crisis of 2008 is about the broader picture, and only has an ambiguous title as a way of deal with nitpickers who didn't want that article to be called the 2008 global recession. The merge would help differentiate these very different topics, and remove the redundancies which now exist. The main problem is choosing the the best titles for the two resulting articles. NJGW (talk) 19:18, 28 September 2008 (UTC)
  • Economic crisis of 2008 concerns all the economic crises of 2008. Financial crisis of 2007-2008 is a chronic credit crisis which emerged at a specific date, August 9, 2008, and which will continue after the resolution of the events of September 8, an acute crisis. Fred Talk 21:06, 28 September 2008 (UTC)
• Merge (this comment is moved from another talk page to keep the discussion together) I'd tend to agree that the appropriate merge is with Liquidity crisis of September 2008. This article gives a historical frame, then the immediate events of September. It should be straightforward to back off from the detailed investigation of events in the U.S, which this article does, to the larger global picture offered by the aforementioned article. There are easily a half-dozen topics that touch on some aspect of this failure/crisis and great care will have to be taken. Merging them all will make for an extremely unwieldy piece of work. Good linkage may be the key, that and a continuing refinement of the issues discussed in each article. 216.166.142.253 (talk) 19:46, 28 September 2008 (UTC)
• Separate articles This article, Liquidity crisis of September 2008, however titled is about the dramatic events of this month, mostly centered in the United States; Financial crisis of 2007-2008 is about the credit crunch which has persisted on a chronic basis since August, 2007, and which can be anticipated to continue for an indeterminate time following resolution of the the acute and dramatic crisis of September, 2008. Financial crisis of 2007-2008 should be an overview of one of the crises which affected the world in 2008. Other crises are the oil price crisis and the food crisis. Fred Talk 21:06, 28 September 2008 (UTC)

comment as is pointed out below, the "credit crunch" is mostly covered at Subprime mortgage crisis. NJGW (talk) 17:39, 29 September 2008 (UTC)

• Comment: how about, instead of merging these two articles together, we merge them into a third, namely: Subprime mortgage crisis? Especially Financial crisis of 2007-2008. I can perhaps understand the need for this article to talk about the events this September (though does it have to be "Liquidity crisis of September 2008" - isn't there a better name than "liquidity"?), but I think it would be best to merge this one too. Deamon138 (talk) 01:19, 29 September 2008 (UTC)
• Separate articles Whatever the article is ultimately called, the biggest single day drop in the history of the Dow Industrial Average, mirrored by staggering falls in markets globally, deserves its own article. –Cg-realms (talk • contribs) 18:07, 29 September 2008 (EDT)
• Keep this article, expand and rename to something like Economic crisis during September 2008. I don't think "liquidity" is a very good name for this: it is more than a crisis in liquidity, the whole economy is effected (though I could accept "financial" rather than "economic" -although the "crisis" seems to have gone beyond just the finance sector e.g. AIG). Also, I suggest "during" rather than "of", because it is clear that this crisis has lasted longer than this month, and will last longer, but that this month has been the worst so far. It would be like having an article on "World War of 1917" when the war of 1914,15,16 and 18 is the same war, and hence "World War during 1917" (if that particular year was notable like this month is here) would be a better name in that analogy. What do people think? Deamon138 (talk) 23:26, 29 September 2008 (UTC)
• Merge January 2008 stock market volatility into Financial crisis of 2007-2008, a sentence or two should be enough. In hindsight it was just a bump in the road. Liquidity crisis of September 2008 should have a separate article. It is a climax event which will probably be in the history books and should have its own article. Unless things look up, events tomorrow September 30 should probably make history, and not in a good way. Fred Talk 01:52, 30 September 2008 (UTC)

• You have a source that says everything's going to be OK in October?  :) I can see a bunch of events eventually becoming a timeline for Economic crisis of 2008-2009, with Subprime mortgage crisis being one of the daughter articles, and perhaps Stock market crash of September 2008 being another one. Remember though, percentage wise ist's still not that bad, and I haven't heard of any broker's hitting the pavement at high speed yet. NJGW (talk) 04:46, 30 September 2008 (UTC)

• Well no crash in September, though here's hoping we can get past October 29, remembering what happened last time. Deamon138 (talk) 00:29, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

• Merge It seems like Liquidity crisis of September 2008, Emergency_Economic_Stabilization_Act_of_2008, and Proposed_bailout_of_United_States_financial_system, among others, are really all aspects of the same central article/event. It seems like this event has gotten an inordinant number of articles because it is such a large feature in the news and public conciousness. If all were merged the resulting article would probably be more comprehensive and clearly notable. Further, if individual pieces are viewed to have actually been more significant than others when the dust settles (or perspective is otherwise gained), then seperating those out into their own individual articles would still be possible, leaving a stronger central article. Darker Dreams (talk) 18:02, 30 September 2008 (UTC)
• Oppose Currently, this article is the target for the overall September panic, Proposed_bailout_of_United_States_financial_system is an overview of the various versions of the "Paulson Plan" to solve this via leglislations, and it's two main sub-articles: Emergency_Economic_Stabilization_Act_of_2008 details the original House bill, and H.R. 1424 details the Senate bill. This may have seemed like a good idea a week and a half ago, but it's too much material to fit in one article now. -- Kendrick7^talk 05:26, 3 October 2008 (UTC)
• Merge Liquidity crisis of September 2008 and Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008 should be merged with Financial crisis of 2007-2008. They all are basically the same thing and they all deal with the same subject matter. The combined page will have to be edited, of course, to avoid repetition. --Rittard (talk) 05:03, 5 October 2008 (UTC)

---

Now that the "liquidity crisis" has has spilled over to October, is anyone actually still opposing the merge? (though it seems there's enough support for it above anyway) NJGW (talk) 19:21, 6 October 2008 (UTC)

[s]Yes, although this article does need to be renamed[/s] (the liquidity crisis seems to have started with the failure of Indy Mac anyway). Per WP:TIND, I don't like racing current events and trying to decide what deserves an article on a daily basis. We can wait until 2010 for some historical perspective, for all I care, assuming we haven't had to sell our computers for food and can fight off the roving bands of wolves long enough to have time to edit.... -- Kendrick7^talk 20:37, 6 October 2008 (UTC)

Neutral. There is no hurry to pick an article to merge Liquidity ... September 2008 with, if any. After a few years, and the hidden stories have emerged (who actually ran out of liquidity before depositors got nervous, who had a run caused by unfounded rumors, and who just had hungry short sellers on their tail) there will be several articles here, just as the savings and loans crisis also has articles on the mutual savings bank failures, and one specifically about Franklin. In 2007, we are told the crises were bad debts from sub-prime mortgages, and the crash in value of CDOs. In September 2008, we are told something new happened: the money markets become unable to trade cash without central bank support. --Hroðulf (or Hrothulf) (Talk) 21:19, 6 October 2008 (UTC)

The article's information is substantially in the target article Financial crisis of 2007-2008 and no harm would come from redirecting to that article.
-- Yellowdesk (talk) 15:53, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

On second thought, upon review I agree these two should be merged. Although, I'm not convinced that just because one bank had to borrow extra money in 2007 that the crisis would actually date to then, since even that bank, Northern Rock, didn't go belly up until February 2008, but I'm a bit of a nit. -- Kendrick7^talk 16:42, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

• Support: Nja247 (talk • contribs) 19:08, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

• Oppose, but rename The dramatic events of September and October 2008 deserve their own detailed article. Most of the blow by blow material in Financial crisis of 2007-2008 needs to be moved and summarized as events move beyond it. This article should be renamed to whatever term comes into general use to refer to it. During the Great Depression stocks dropped by 82% and took 3 years to do it. However there is still a place for the Crash of 1929. Fred Talk 20:42, 8 October 2008 (UTC)
• I have renamed it to Global financial crisis of September-October, 2008 but not as a resolution of this discussion, just a interim suggestion. What this will be called in history remains unknown. Fred Talk 04:07, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

5% drop today

There's been a 5%+ drop oon DOW and NASDAQ indexes as of right now today. Any possibility this is the article for information related to that? 69.134.39.69 (talk) 18:38, 29 September 2008 (UTC)

Yes, this is the article for blow by blow accounts of the "crisis" such as it is. While the emphasis should be on lack of availability of credit, stock market events are also significant. In what I think should be the scheme of things, Financial crisis of 2007-2008 should not have this level of detail but be a summary on a scale of years, months and weeks, not daily reports of this nature. So, yes, here. Fred Talk 05:06, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

Whose fault is this?

Some wp:RS and wp:V links on this topic: Talk:Financial_crisis_of_2007–2008#Possible_background_cause. NJGW (talk) 07:41, 5 October 2008 (UTC)

Panic of 2008

Given the events during the past few days leading up to this post (Oct. 7, 2008) it is time to bite the bullet and give this macroeconomic phenomenon a label that comports with historical usage: The Panic of 2008. The closest analogues to recent events are the various panics of the latter part of the 19th Century. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Rantwell (talk • contribs) 11:21, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

• Nope. Got to get consensus here before changing the title. -- Yellowdesk (talk) 15:50, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

I thought about this too, Rantwell, but what this will come to be called will be the job of future historians. My sources agree that the liquidity situation is akin to the Panic of 1873 which came near the beginning of the Long Depression.[1] -- Kendrick7^talk 16:32, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

Since we've never seen a global financial crisis before, this one gets to be called The Global Financial Crisis, sort of like World War I was The Great War. Same goes for The Global Economic Crisis: first one gets the name. [1929 and The Great Depression weren't global the way this one is.] DOR (HK) (talk) 08:37, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Page is locked, but I don't see the lock icon on page?

Anybody know why it is locked? 71.131.4.194 (talk) 15:37, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

• An administrator locked it because of renaming/page move vandalism and forgot to put on the lock template. -- Yellowdesk (talk) 15:49, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

Remove comma from the title

Resolved

 – It is now so renamed (not by me). 84user (talk) 09:37, 11 October 2008 (UTC)

I don't see why we need a comma between the months and the year, especially in the title. This makes the article title more complex than it needs to be. I suggest to move it to Global financial crisis of September-October 2008. NerdyNSK (talk) 17:30, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

Name

Resolved

 – It is now so renamed (not by me). 84user (talk) 09:37, 11 October 2008 (UTC)

This article should be moved to Global financial crisis of September-October 2008 per Wikipedia:Manual of Style (dates and numbers)#Dates, "Wikipedia does not insert a comma between month and year". --Pwnage8 (talk) 19:48, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

This article should be moved to Global financial crisis of September–October 2008 (it should be an en dash in the date range instead of a hyphen). LonelyMarble (talk) 20:50, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

Name change

Please change the name of this article to Wall Street Crash of 2008. Thanks. The reason why is because it is already the biggest crash since the great depression. No further explanations is needed. Thanks again. Camilo Sanchez (Talk) 03:50, 10 October 2008

Trouble is this is more than just a story about Wall Street, and there are already several discussions here on the subject, in case you would like to join them. NJGW (talk) 03:54, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

One problem with this is that the loss in the value of equities, which is worldwide, not limited to Wall Street, is only a symptom of an underlying credit crisis. The crash, while it could be foreseen, was not evident to journalists during the period in late September when the crisis built after the initial failures of financial institutions. Depending on how events go next week I think we might have an article about the actual crash during the last eight days. I hesitate to start such an article because events next week might be more deserving of the title, crash. Fred Talk 15:58, 11 October 2008 (UTC)

European banking system

Please clarify the meaning of this. Kittybrewster ☎ 10:53, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

It just means European banks. I changed the paragraph because it was copy/pasted from the source. Please see if it makes more sense now. NJGW (talk) 14:12, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

Time line

The "Time line" section begins "On the first day, the Dow Jones Industrial Average plunged 504 points.." Please give a calendar date atthe beginning of this sentence to specify exactly what date is referred to. Edison (talk) 21:05, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

September 15, 2008 Fred Talk 18:40, 11 October 2008 (UTC)

This was left over from the old article "Liquidity crisis of September 2008" (Not sure that is the exact title) before merger with detailed information from "Financial crisis of 2007–2008". I have removed that material and attempted to integrate it into the merged material. More remains to be done toward the bottom of the article. Fred Talk 16:03, 11 October 2008 (UTC)

America-centric Bias

The article seems to be lacking quite a lot of relevant information about the crisis outside of America. I'd say the problems with HBOS, Bradford and Bingly in the UK, the crash in banking share prices and effects on the Asian markets could all do with more detail, as well as the European Union reaction to the crisis. 81.154.94.27 (talk) 21:41, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

Yes, information about most of the events mentioned could be expanded. There was pressure to merge material from Financial crisis of 2007–2008 and that was done, but that material, in an article with a temporal framework of years, is only a summary, more detailed than what was here, but still only a summary. I, an American, wrote most of that material, and while I read the Guardian, The Times, and The Financial Times, I don't focus on European developments, or understand them as well, as I do American developments. Hopefully, some editors with a European perspective will step up. Fred Talk 16:09, 11 October 2008 (UTC)

UBS summary of September 18 events

I found the roundup by UBS Investment bank (which they also posted here on YouTube) helped me understand the situation in the section Week of September 14, 2008 up to the Paulson plan. I put an almost complete transcript at User:84user/Sources#UBS daily roundup for 2008 September 19. Here are brief excerpts:

... three distinct events that mean that the beginning of the end of the credit crisis ... First, the central banks of the world injected massive amounts of liquidity, and in doing so resolved the immediate issue of the collapse of money markets. ... a public-sector injection of capital into the banking system was now under consideration. ... this would be the socialization of the banking system's problems, which is required. ... The good news is that Comrade Schumer and his fellow commissars in government are reducing the duration of that downturn, perhaps to a length of a couple of years. Without the socialising of the banking problem, the duration of the downturn could have been of Japanese proportions. ... -84user (talk) 09:56, 11 October 2008 (UTC)

This is a possible source for clarifying what was happening during that period. However, the liquidity crisis is far from over, see http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2008/10/08/business/economy/20081008-credit-chart-graphic.html Note that progress is limited to overnight commercial funds (I think there has been some sort of intervention with respect to overnight rates), other measures continue to deteriorate. The note is rather tendentious, however: referring to senators and government officials who would support capitalism with their dying breath as "comrade" is rather ridiculous. Fred Talk 17:14, 11 October 2008 (UTC)

Title

I suggest the title of this article should be Global financial crisis of 2008. Adding the months September and October only causes confusion. I could of course simply add a redirect unless anyone objects.- Ipigott (talk) 15:30, 11 October 2008 (UTC)

I believe you mean "merge with Financial crisis of 2007–2008"... yes this is an ongoing problem. NJGW (talk) 15:43, 11 October 2008 (UTC)

I'm not sure about Global financial crisis of 2008, but there is clear authority that the crisis first surfaced in August, 2007. Fred Talk 17:19, 11 October 2008 (UTC)

It is quite impossible to know what this event will called in history books; any title used now is provisional and somewhat arbitrary. Fred Talk 17:22, 11 October 2008 (UTC)

• And I'll remark that the recent crisis is merely a continuation of earlier worries and financial-firm crisis in 2008 and 2007. September 2008 merely is the month that the whale leaped out of the water, visible to all. -- Yellowdesk (talk) 15:32, 16 October 2008 (UTC)

Oslo Question

From the text below:

"Stocks fell dramatically Monday in Europe and the US despite infusion of funds into the market for short term credit.[35][36] In the US the Dow dropped 777 points (6.98%), the largest one-day point-drop in history (but only the 17th largest percentage drop).[37] In Norway, the OBX Index of Oslo Stock Exchange dropped 8.3%, its third largest drop ever in one day.[38]"

I removed the last sentence about Oslo Stock Exchange. Somebody (probably from Oslo ;-) identified that edit as vandalism. I removed it because Oslo Stock Exchange is a minor stock echange and cannot be classified as a major financial center. Therefore it is completely unnecessary to expose Oslo. Why to write about Oslo and not to mention Nikkei? Just a little common sense... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.210.143.156 (talk) 06:41, 12 October 2008 (UTC)

The issue is that Iceland as a country is on the brink of going bankrupt. That's significant. It should be expanded to include that information. NJGW (talk) 06:44, 12 October 2008 (UTC)

Also, the section should be expanded to include more than just the US. NJGW (talk) 06:50, 12 October 2008 (UTC)

The English Wikipedia is an international global institution which should chronicle events in both Norway and Japan. As to the Oslo exchange, if it is the main exchange in the country, it is probably significant. Fred Talk 13:43, 12 October 2008 (UTC)

September 14 as start date?

How can this date be appropriate when Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac went into conservatorship on September 6. Their tumble should mark the beginning seems more appropriate to me. __meco (talk) 18:30, 12 October 2008 (UTC)

This article is about stock market crashes... you are thinking about other articles which mergers and rename discussions here and there are trying to address. NJGW (talk) 18:41, 12 October 2008 (UTC)

Actually, no, while stock market crashes figure prominently, the crisis is a credit crisis, a collapse of interbank and other short term lending. Fred Talk 17:38, 13 October 2008 (UTC)

I may not be adequately informed with respect to the big picture, but they all seem interconnected to me, and everything that this article discusses surely was set off to a large part by that takeover, and again by all that led to it. __meco (talk) 19:27, 12 October 2008 (UTC)

You seem pretty informed on the real-life big picture, but the in-wiki big picture is that Economic crisis of 2008 and Financial crisis of 2007–2008 also exist, and address different issues. See the talk pages of those articles for the main discussions on the naming issues. The background you are looking for is mostly addressed (or at least should be) at those articles. I think it's time somebody got bold and really worked to differentiate these three articles as the confusion keeps growning... at least two should be renamed/merged and then rewritten to reflect the intended identities. NJGW (talk) 19:31, 12 October 2008 (UTC)

A bit more context: Economic crisis of 2008 was originally 2008 recession or something like that (dealing with food prices, energy prices, job losses, consumer confidence drops, and the big picture), Financial crisis is supposed to be about banking and credit issues leading to present day stock market issues, and "Global financial..." (this article) was originally "Liquidity crisis of September 2008" (meant to address just series of events following the AIG/Lehman Bros SNAFU and the stock market crashes since. NJGW (talk) 19:35, 12 October 2008 (UTC)

Historic background is missing

The first section after the introduction should be a comprehensive recapitulation of developments leading up the September 2008, starting with September 2007 and the US housing bubble situation. __meco (talk) 18:34, 12 October 2008 (UTC)

Yes, also the sections at the bottom of the page should be edited and the information in them be more appropriately integrated into the article. Fred Talk 19:27, 13 October 2008 (UTC)

Propose move to Global credit crunch of 2008

For archival puporses, the topic is changing from Global financial crisis of September–October 2008 to Global credit crunch of 2008

---

Given all the confusion, I propose a move to Global credit crunch of 2008. This is highly descriptive of the article's scope, NPOV, and allows the article to co-exist with other "crisis" articles in the series. Can we decide quickly given the number of name issues that keep coming up? NJGW (talk) 19:40, 12 October 2008 (UTC)

I agree with that, after I checked that the BBC was preferring credit crunch to credit crisis. I would also be happy with the simpler Credit crunch of 2008, assuming that any article with no country prefix must be global. -84user (talk) 00:20, 13 October 2008 (UTC)

Agreed, don't really need the "Global". Fred, if you agree, I'd say that's enough support so go ahead and move it once you read this. NJGW (talk) 00:25, 13 October 2008 (UTC)

The term which seems to be in general use is global credit crisis which googles over a million. However, use of that term for the brief events of the last few days, or weeks, conflates the timeframe with the larger crisis which began in August, 2007 and may extend for a few years into the future. Fred Talk 19:17, 13 October 2008 (UTC)

I don't think the google search means anything for the reason you give plus any other time global credit crisis is used. These two searches: [2] and [3] show "financial crisis" associated with events as old as the 1700s, and most often associated with the late 1990s, while "credit crunch" appears on the scene in the 1970s and really takes off Q3 of 2007. This is all academic though, that the article is about a credit crunch is obvious (no money for lenders to give to borrowers b/c they're afraid the old borrowers aren't paying up), and the point now is to stop these renaming threads ever 18 hours. NJGW (talk) 19:30, 13 October 2008 (UTC)

This article from April, 2008 nicely illustrates the problem. A title with a specified, and accurate, time frame is better. Fred Talk 19:23, 13 October 2008 (UTC)

It seems to me that that credit crisis that article is talking about is related to the 2007 housing market issues. What we're talking about is a much bigger picture and there is a credit crunch on a much larger scale. At the very least I don't see any issues with declaring it the credit crunch of 2008 (at least temporarily so that people coming to Wikipedia for info don't leave more confused than when they got here). NJGW (talk) 19:48, 13 October 2008 (UTC)

Oppose the proposed change to Global credit crunch of 2008. The redirect gets people to the article, if that happens to be their search method. "Financial crisis" is more comprehensive and less colloquial. The crisis involves both credit, and stock values, and their relations in various aspects of commerce, as well as concerns about deposits and runs on banks. Let the name sit for a while longer before contemplating another change. As to the limit of the two months, I don't mind simply naming the year only. Bear in mind that this event will not be over on December 31, 2008.-- Yellowdesk (talk) 15:14, 15 October 2008 (UTC)

There are two problems. The first is that there is already an article called Financial crisis of 2007-2008, so renaming to "financial crisis of 2008" is really awkward. The second is that the similarity in names (including to Economic crisis of 2008) is prooving very confusing to people, leading new editors to propose naming changes all the time (see this talk section above and those in the other articles as well). We need a name that is descriptive enough for people to know what the article is about. The issues with "stock values, and their relations in various aspects of commerce, as well as concerns about deposits and runs on banks" all start from the credit cruch that killed Lehman Bros. and woke up everyone who had been riding the wave of irrational exuberance, so there should be no problem there. NJGW (talk) 16:12, 15 October 2008 (UTC)

• This article can be safely merged into the skeletal Financial crisis of 2007-2008, and that article is properly a sub-article of the Wikipedia:Summary style topic: Economic crisis of 2008. The world of economics is vastly larger than the financial discussion under way, and much of that Economics article belongs in a "Financial" article.
  -- Yellowdesk (talk) 14:17, 17 October 2008 (UTC)

Merger with Economic crisis of 2008

The proposal to merge this article with Economic crisis of 2008, previously resolved, is not good due to the nature of that article which is a grab-bag of various interlinked crises. In fact it ought to be renamed economic crises of 2008; the oil price crisis particularly moves in the opposite direction as the credit crunch. Also, as the credit crunch originated in 2007, calling it a crisis of 2008 disregards the actual timeframe of the crisis. Fred Talk 19:32, 13 October 2008 (UTC)

Agreed. This topic should be an entry there (as it now is) but is too large/growing to be contained at that article (at least for now). Keeping the separate will help keep the concepts straight as well as preserve information until such a time as a need and way to merge becomes clearer (assuming we still have computers once this is all done with ;) NJGW (talk) 19:51, 13 October 2008 (UTC)

• Separate articles and possibly consider renaming. This article gives an important and relatively in-depth chronology of events, while Economic crisis of 2008 gives a broad overview of global and regional aspects of the crisis. Perhaps we should clean up the latter to make it give a more general picture of what happenned in important individual countries, and leave the chronologies for this article, maybe renaming it to Global financial crisis: September - October 2008. Denito (talk) 12:35, 15 October 2008 (UTC)
• There should be exactly one main article for the crisis/crises, with various sub-articles that treat individual aspects. Thus, economic crisis of 2008 and financial crisis of 2007-2008 should merge together. Neutral regarding the merger of the September-October 2008 article into either of the main article(s). 69.140.152.55 (talk) 18:42, 15 October 2008 (UTC)

• Opposed to a merger with the Economic crisis article. Economics is a vastly larger topic than the financial gyrations described here. Economic events cause the financial events described here, certainly. This article is a suitable sub-article to the larger topic Economics... which should be transformed into a summary article that links to various detailed sub-articles such as this one.
  -- Yellowdesk (talk) 16:07, 16 October 2008 (UTC)

• Support I agree with 69.140.152.55. See the Great Depression for a template of how it should be handled. Consequently, this merge is just one part of the process. 212.84.105.152 (talk) 18:10, 21 October 2008 (UTC)

What about merging with the article Financial crisis of 2008 ??? Most people search on financial crisis and not on GLOBAL financial crisis - so they may never find this article unless they follow the internal links. The background could easily be summarised in the intro to the "Global" article, reducing the need for a separate analysis. -Ipigott (talk) 10:36, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

Four special situations

At least 3 nations have suffered particularly severe crises, Iceland, Hungary, and Russia. There may be more, I think I saw something about Romania. The eventual article should have sections on those situations and their resolution. Also Switzerland, which has a major banking component has not been heard from. That they don't have banks collapsing is news too. UBS has made major writedowns, however. Fred Talk 22:27, 13 October 2008 (UTC)

Suggestion re: Structure

The first two paragraphs each introduce speculation as to cause. Paragraph one suggests neoliberal financial policies, paragraph two the subprime meltdown. These views are not necessarily congruent, and in any case they are abbreviated, one-sided, and weasel-worded. Introducing them in the beginning also seems to disrupt the natural reading flow. I suggest moving all discussion of cause to a separate section. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.253.148.163 (talk) 21:22, 15 October 2008 (UTC)

• The text in question has been completely revised. Agreed, it previously was not suitable. -- Yellowdesk (talk) 14:49, 16 October 2008 (UTC)

Article structure and looking ahead to 2009

We have three main articles, Economic crisis of 2008, Financial crisis of 2007–2008, and Global financial crisis of September–October 2008 (and a large number of failed merger and rename proposals), with Subprime mortgage crisis also in the background. Financial crisis of 2007–2008 puts it well when it says that in September 2008, "the financial crisis entered an acute phase". That is the real subject of the present article - the acute phase of the longer-term financial crisis which began in 2007 with subprime. It seems quite plausible that the acute phase is winding down now, at least in the G-7, after the bailouts, capital injections, etc., of October; in which case the long-term article names may be something like "Global credit crunch of 2007-2009" and "Global financial crisis of late 2008". (Ultimately the crisis may just be a prelude to a new "Bretton Woods".)

Meanwhile, Economic crisis of 2008 is mostly about the "real" (non-financial) economy. The one safe prediction here is that the article will have to be renamed "Economic crisis of 2008–2009". Whether it will make sense to talk about "Global recession of 2009", or whether we will be looking at disconnected regional recessions around the world, remains to be seen. Mporter (talk) 08:48, 17 October 2008 (UTC)

• The Financial crisis of 2007–2008 is such a skeleton, there is still no harm in merging this article completely into it, solving the name problem until the end of the year, and allowing expansion of the combined article to determine how to divide it in the Wikipedia:Summary style. The econimics article properly refers to this article in summary style, and there's no conflict that there is an Economics and Financial article.
  -- Yellowdesk (talk) 13:49, 17 October 2008 (UTC)

Financial crisis of 2007–2008 needs work, but does not need the blow by blow that, properly, is in this article. This is about the collapse, or crash. Financial crisis of 2007–2008 is the about the underlying financial crisis. Fred Talk 05:04, 18 October 2008 (UTC)

• That would be true if that article (as of this date) actually had some content. Its content is minimal, as of this date. I say combine them, and see how events show us how to divide it up later.
  -- Yellowdesk (talk) 05:31, 18 October 2008 (UTC)

It may very well be that the current crisis will develop into a global collapse that will so overshadow its cause that that cause might seem trivial, but we don't know that yet. Fred Talk 20:42, 24 October 2008 (UTC)

Necessary, appropriate or effective

This article reports, somewhat accurately, the various measure taken to avoid, or remedy the crisis. There is no reliable source that any of those actions were necessary, appropriate or effective. Fred Talk 05:04, 18 October 2008 (UTC)

• And your point is what? -- Yellowdesk (talk) 05:33, 18 October 2008 (UTC)

An emerging theme: currencies (and a proposed synopsis of events)

There is a lot of raw material being gathered in these week-by-week reports (which seem, by the way, to be a very effective way to aggregate heterogeneous information). But there are some other dramatic events not making it in - see [4][5] - and there will also need to be some analytical order extracted from the timeline eventually. I am still struggling to get a grip on the latest events but it roughly seems to be as follows:

The Lehman bankruptcy triggered the acute phase of the crisis. This led to the US bailout proposal, which was soon joined by comparable actions throughout the EU and elsewhere. There has initially been greater cooperation within the G-7 economies, as evidenced by the Fed's extension of dollar swap lines to certain central banks, while the BRIC countries have to fend for themselves on the basis of the forex reserves they built up in this decade. (A notable, but possibly minor, part of this phase has been sharp currency movements caused by deleveraging - the end of the yen carry trade has sent the Australian dollar down, for example, and it has been argued that the recent US dollar rise is also due to similar technical and temporary considerations.) But the need for a coordinated response beyond the G-7 - exemplified by statements from the recent ASEM meeting and by calls for the G-20 to play a role - has culminated for now in the planned crisis meeting in Washington DC on November 15, less than two weeks after the US presidential election.

Or, to summarize the summary, there are two tracks to what is going on: the economic events, and the political response. Much of the economic timeline and some of the political timeline has been chronicled here, while some of the currency politics is being chronicled at Bretton Woods II. Mporter (talk) 11:47, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

Yes, it is hard to write about the overall picture with events changing daily. Here is a bit about the Yen carry trade. There is a currency crisis developing now which is several removes from the problem of subprime mortgages. Fred Talk 18:47, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

From our Bretton Woods article: "The planners at Bretton Woods hoped to avoid a repeat of the debacle of the 1930s, when foreign exchange controls undermined the international payments system that was the basis for world trade" Fred Talk 02:04, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

Latest name change

What's the difference between Global financial crisis of 2008 and Financial crisis of 2007-2008? NJGW (talk) 21:21, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

This is an acute crisis which began in September 2008. The Financial crisis of 2007-2008 is a chronic crisis which began in August, 2007. Fred Talk 00:31, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

I don't see how we can say that it's a "chronic" crisis when it's barely a year old. Are you still against calling this article (which used to be called the "liquidity crisis") the Credit crisis of 2008? NJGW (talk) 01:26, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

Yes, it has moved beyond its origins and become a general crisis threatening the foundations of international trade. How can anyone conduct trade with currencies fluctuating 5% in a day? or 30% in a year? Fred Talk 02:02, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

I believe within the next 12 months we will have a better idea as to what to name the current articles regarding the economic and banking crisis etc. I believe a working title for the present crash could be New Great Crash of 2008 (Google it to find the list of links already). However I support the merger of Global financial crisis of 2008 and Financial crisis of 2007-2008 in the short term and rename it to the Global financial crisis of 2007-2008. Cutmynoseofftospitemyface (talk) 19:53, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

I too find the existence of the two articles confusing and misleading. Everyone talks about the financial crisis and not about the global financial crisis. I strongly suggest, despite Fred's Resolved tag, to rename the main article Financial crisis of 2008 as soon as possible, change the title of the present Financial crisis of 2007-2008 to something like Origins of the 2007-2008 financial crisis and carry out any additional necessary editing. At the moment, people looking for Financial crisis will turn up the weaker of the two articles.Ipigott (talk) 11:18, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

"Global financial crisis" googles about 1,440,000. Fred Talk 15:52, 8 November 2008 (UTC)

"Financial crisis of 2008" googles 20 times more with about 26,000,000.-Ipigott (talk) 19:05, 8 November 2008 (UTC)

Global is redundant, as Wikipedia articles are supposed to cover topics from an International perspective to begin with. So technically it doesn't follow the Manual of Style. - RoyBoy 04:57, 26 November 2008 (UTC)

Auto sales percentage changes

A note regarding the percentage drops in U.S. auto sales figures by the press (as listed in the Reports of economic activity section) -- those percentages are compared to the same month of the previous year, not the previous month of the same year. Thus, seeing headlines of "X reports 30% drop in sales in the month of Y" month after month means that the year is consistently down 30% from the previous year, not that sales are dropping 30% every month, which most readers assume (although most articles bury the fact it's a year-to-year comparison further down in the article). --Vossanova ^o< 20:04, 12 November 2008 (UTC)

"Current" tag?

There seem to be different opinions on whether this article justifies the "current" tag. Maybe the topic should be aired here? I would take the pragmatic view that a user might, knowing nothing of this crisis, find this article; we need to make it clear that this is not a final, definitive report subject only to corrections and interpretations, but the current state of play of a continuing process. The Wikipedia guidelines don't seem to give an unambiguous criterion, and we should perhaps be guided not by rules but by whether it is more useful to the reader to have this tag. My opinion is to use the "current" tag. Pol098 (talk) 20:16, 17 November 2008 (UTC)

Yellowdesk is very adament that the tag is only for articles which are edited by hundreds of editors each day, and indeed this is what the tag's guidelines say, but attempts at rewording the tag haven't gone anywhere on the tag's talk page. Perhaps a new tag should be created. NJGW (talk) 21:05, 17 November 2008 (UTC)

At first I thought Yellowdesk was a bot that, almost all his edits seem to be to remove this one single tag.

For the record, I would double check who actually wrote the guidelines for this template.

But in this case I don't really see the argument, is it a current event? Yes, is information changing rapidly as the event progresses? Yes. Therefore we need the current tag. FFMG (talk) 17:44, 20 November 2008 (UTC)

• Indeed. The template was specifically created for crisis events with as many as two or three hundred or more edits a day with many editors participating, as a warning to editors to not step on each others' edits. This article doesn't even come close, and is merely a topic "in the news" and is a long-running process like 110th United States Congress, another topic with dozens of news articles a day written about it. The congressional article will continue to be in the news for the foreseeable future, as will this one, just like hundreds of others which do not have the tag, such as, to pick some U.S.-centered articles: Barack Obama, or the post-election activity on United States presidential election, 2008. As such, it is simply an article subject to updating, and this is the standard state of affairs for all Wikipedia articles. The template fundamentally adds nothing to this article, especially when editorial piling-on is not presently occurring. Do please take a look at Template:Current#Guidelines.
  -- Yellowdesk (talk) 16:55, 20 November 2008 (UTC)

My two yen opinion: I do not care what the guideline says, but I do care what the template says, and it is extremely accurate for this article. Either we let the template stay, or we create a manual box in red bold capital letters saying exactly the same thing on the top of the article. The template does not say, in any single word, "editors be careful that other may be editing at the same time". What is says is clear and it is a warning that changes in this article are happening as we talk. I strongly agree to keep the template on the top. Miguel.mateo (talk) 01:53, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

The current tag should remain so long as the front page of every major newspaper in the world has articles about this event nearly every day, even if the crisis lasts for several years. I realize the article is not getting a lot of editing. The matter is difficult. It is hard to be conservative in editing with a locomotive bearing down on you. Fred Talk 02:52, 23 November 2008 (UTC)

• The above statement is the equivalent of saying "Barack Obama's article shall have a current tag on it as long as he is president because he will perpetually be involved in newsworthy and complex activities." You may get the impression, from this perspective that the tag is not informative to the reader, and the lede of the article is capable of far more (accurate) eloquence than "this article is is subject to change". -- Yellowdesk (talk) 05:04, 25 November 2008 (UTC)

Running Total of Nationalizations

We've been hearing about the US, Britain, etc. taking over institutions.

What I'm not finding anywhere is a ledger sheet of just how much (the US government in particular) has nationalized so far.

What percentage of the US banking sector, and financial sector, is owned by the US government now?

In fact, strangely I don't even see the word "nationalization" used anywhere in reference to any of the US governments actions -- despite it just nationalizing another 3 Californian savings & loans last week -- despite just "investing" 25 billion in Citibank which was something like half its value at that time... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.36.147.191 (talk) 02:19, 24 November 2008 (UTC)

• The "investing" is in the form of "senior preferred stock" which typically does not have the much of the voting rights that common stock has. In this sense the government investments do not take control of the financial firms in question. As for the "nationalizing" of a savings and loan bank, this is a mere regulatory action, akin to the action of a bankruptcy court, to take over the management and control of an insolvent, or nearly insolvent bank, in order to wind up its affairs, or liquidate in an orderly fashion, or sell to another banking entity...rather different than "nationalization". The regulatory entities are not interested in owning or operating these banks, and they're eager to get them out of their supervision, as soon as possible. -- Yellowdesk (talk) 04:59, 25 November 2008 (UTC)

Merge from Stock market bottom?

Resolved

 – Original section proposed for merge has been removed --Seajay (talk) 10:01, 25 November 2008 (UTC)

Just wondering how relevant the specific details of the 2008 crash are to the general article describing a 'Stock market bottom'. Would suggest that some of the information there may be of relevance here, but not necessary in that article. Suggest that informaiton from there is merged to here, and removed from there? Seajay (talk) 13:52, 24 November 2008 (UTC)

Global financial crisis of 2008 is a poor place to put these details. The stock market is only a reflection of various unresolved financial difficulties, difficulties that may take years to resolve, even if the stock market recovers. If there is a good recovery, at least a month, it might be appropriate to create Crash of 2008, an article which would deal only with market values. The material would fit there, and there would, provisionally, have been a bottom. Fred Talk 20:13, 24 November 2008 (UTC)

Lead sentence

I'm not 100% sure the lead sentence is totally appropriate for what is supposed to be an encyclopedic article. In saying that the crisis is "the worst of its kind since the Great Depression" we're emulating tabloid-y language that is designed to lure less-observant readers into thinking that the crisis is as bad as the Great Depression, whereas it's "merely" worse than any that has occurred since. I know that might seem like a minor distinction to make, but the effects of the Great Depression were several orders of magnitude worse than what we've seen so far with this one. The statement is factually correct, and I've no objection to its use somewhere, but I feel it would be better placed in the article body, where it can be bolstered by a good supporting explanation and unadorned fact. All the best, Steve ^{T • C} 22:17, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

Analysis of causes

Should there be a section which details a social, economic and political analysis of the cause of this crisis? There have been all sorts of debates, allegations and theories which point out who or what is to blame for this crisis. This article should be treated like one of a plane crash - details of the crash, followed by its cause. Autonova (talk) 13:20, 8 December 2008 (UTC)

• You can find one compilation here at Subprime mortgage crisis. Such analysis is coming out in the journals and publications, and will doubtless continue to be published for the next 50 years. An active ongoing analysis at the New York Times is called The Reckoning.
  -- Yellowdesk (talk) 17:20, 8 December 2008 (UTC)

Subprime crisis impact timeline even better and will be used to make other articles more accurate in their analysis in near future. CarolMooreDC (talk) 17:06, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

So what this article implicitly says, then, is that the entire reason for the global finacial crisis is America's subprime mortgage crisis? In other words, it's all America's fault? If this is not what is intended, then Autonova's suggestion is a good one - to analyze the causes in more detail in this article. 137.82.175.12 (talk) 01:32, 9 January 2009 (UTC)

Removing graph in intro

Federal Reserve System excess reserve deposits over polling graph for the presidential candidates

There is a graph in the intro of presidential polling numbers vs. "excess reserve balances with federal reserve banks." It is rather confusing and does not directly relate to the topic, or at very least it does not belong in the intro. While I am sure the financial crisis played a role in the election, and I fancy excess reserves balances in federal banks are indeed an indicator of a flight from risk and financial turmoil, the graph does little to advance understanding of the topic at hand. Please feel free to discuss here if you wish to return it. Thanks. Wachholder (talk) 04:00, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

Rather than an effect, or possibly addition to being an effect, I believe the hoarding of bailout money in interest-bearing excess reserve accounts on deposit at the Fed is a cause of the credit liquidity crisis. For details see Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008#Interest on bank deposits held by the Federal Reserve from where the graph was taken. As the excess balances began growing at the beginning of September, before the provision allowing interest to be paid on them was even proposed, I think it is clear that the hoarding of capital by banks is a cause rather than an effect. Is there any evidence to the contrary? In any case, unless there is any evidence that the nearly $1 trillion which used to be part of the credit markets is not a cause of the continuing credit liquidity crisis, then the graph should be replaced. GetLinkPrimitiveParams (talk) 18:51, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

I've decided to replace it with the official graphs alone, and return the composite graph to the pertinent section. GetLinkPrimitiveParams (talk) 06:24, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

This is not relevant and should be removed

Slovakia starts using euro

Dual pricing, ahead of the change, has become common in Slovakia.The European country of Slovakia replaced the koruna with the euro as its official currency on January 1, 2009. Slovakia is the sixteenth country to start using the euro. The official conversion rate was set at 30.126 koruna to one euro.[235]

Joaquín Almunia, the European Union Economic and Monetary Affairs Commissioner, stated that the conversion will be "a proud moment for the euro area [...] the euro has become the symbol of EU identity and is protecting us against the tremendous external shocks that we have had to cope with since the summer of 2007."[236]

January 1 also marks the tenth anniversary of the euro being introduced as globally exchangeable currency.[237]

[edit] Russian teen's US fashion chain bankrupt with $54.4 million debts KP Fashion, the United States chain that sells clothing designed by 16-year-old Russian designer Kira Plastinina, has filed for bankruptcy. Papers supplied to the court in Manhattan show the Los Angeles based company has assets of $9.7 million compared to debt of $54.4 million. [238]

Plastinina's father spent $80 million founding the company for her seven months ago and most of the twelve open and two new stores are to go. The company also has outlets in Russia, Ukraine and Kazakhstan, and a webstore that is listing 70% discounts. Cyprus-based Lendero is the biggest creditor seeking repayment on a $29.9 million loan. [239]Jandrews23jandrews23 (talk) 21:54, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

This image needs fixing before it is included

Color scheme:

  Countries in recession as of December 2008

  Severely affected countries

This image keeps popping up. I'm pretty sure it is very wrong, and its source is not identified. Eb.eric (talk) 04:26, 23 January 2009 (UTC)