What are the greatest risks of a financial crisis, and what is the probability that it will materialise?
We believe there are a three main risks of financial crisis worldwide: A loss of reserve currency status for the dollar , which would have catastrophic effects ( rising dollar interest rates, fall in the dollar's exchange rate); but this is very unlikely given the lack of substitute for the dollar; Financial imbalances, for example: excessive commercial real estate prices in the United States; high real estate debt and prices in Canada and Sweden; excessive consumer credit (auto loans ) in the United States; but are these imbalances large enough to trigger a crisis? We see no major financial imbalance; A crisis in the major emerging countries caused by capital outflows from these countries, trigger ing a deterioration in the terms of trade a nd a rise in interest rates; the probability of such a crisis is quite high.