Global Recession and Negative Interest Rates

SYRACUSE, Sicily – “When in doubt, go to Italy” is the saying.

We are always in doubt. What better place to go?

Today, a warning about why a global recession is now likely.

But first, an update on Sicily… where we’ve spent the last few days exploring.

Sicily is not exactly Italy. It sits in the middle of the Mediterranean, where every sleepy sailor or ambitious empire builder was bound to wash up. The Phoenicians, Greeks, Carthaginians, Romans, Byzantines, Arabs, Normans, Spanish, and French – all tried their hands at ruling Sicily. The Italians are only the most recent of the invaders.“They made crooked deals and built all these ugly apartment buildings you see on the outskirts of town. Many times, they had to tear down ancient buildings that had been there for hundreds of years.”

It was true that there are ugly apartment buildings in the hills surrounding Palermo. But it looked to us like almost any other town. The apartment buildings that the Mafia built were no uglier than those built by the democratically elected government of Baltimore.

“How was it to live in a town run by the Mafia?” we wondered.

“It wasn’t so bad. They killed people who threatened them – but besides that the Mafia ran a fairly decent government.

“There wasn’t much crime. If someone stole something from you, you could usually go to the Mafia and they’d get it back for you.”

More to come…

Reprinted with permission from Bonner & Partners.