Soros: The Current Crisis is the 'Worst in 60 Years'

Business Day, 23 January 2008:

• The current crisis in the world financial markets is the worst "in 60 years", billionaire investor George Soros wrote in the Financial Times today.
• In his comment piece, Soros warned that while a global recession could be held off by strong growth rates in the developing world, the danger was that the resulting political tension from a rebalancing of international economic power could "plunge the world into recession or worse".
• His remarks come after the US Federal Reserve surprised observers by cutting interest rates by 75 basis points to 3.50 per cent, providing some much-needed relief to battered financial markets that had suffered heavy losses in recent days.
• "The current crisis is the culmination of a super-boom that has lasted for more than 60 years," Hungarian-born Soros wrote in the newspaper.
• "Although a recession in the developed world is now more or less inevitable, China, India and some of the oil-producing countries are in a very strong countertrend," he continued, in his op-ed titled The worst market crisis in 60 years.
• "So, the current financial crisis is less likely to cause a global recession than a radical realignment of the global economy, with a relative decline of the US and the rise of China and other countries in the developing world.
• "The danger is that the resulting political tensions, including US protectionism, may disrupt the global economy and plunge the world into recession or worse."