Mark Carney - climate loon

Speaking of climate lunacy, James Delingpole isn't too impressed with Canada's contribution to the BoE. 

Bank of England governor talks rubbish on climate change:
Three things are clear.

1. Carney cannot speak intelligible English, only evasive, flannelly CorporateSpeak.

2. Under Carney’s leadership, the Bank of England has joined the long, long list of institutions speaking well above their pay grade on the climate change issue, which it is palpably obvious they do not understand.

3. Carney, like his greenie activist wife, has bought wholesale into the climate change scare, can barely conceal his lofty contempt for those, such as Lord Lawson, who are not “with the programme”, and thus feels under no obligation to justify his position because he’s right, damn it, all the world’s climate experts say so….

Mark Carney - overrated hypocrite

William Watson:

IMF head Christine Lagarde and Bank of England Governor Mark Carney both spoke last week in London on the subject of “inclusive capitalism” at a highly exclusive conference organized by Lady Lynn Forester de Rothschild ...

... [both] made very literate and interesting speeches arguing that rising inequality ...  fundamentally threatens capitalism ...

Strangely, in view of their concern about inequality, neither ... offered to do their bit by taking a pay cut. ... Carney ... total compensation ...reported to be in the neighbourhood of £1 million per annum. ... If people at the top end making too much money is the dangerous social problem they both think it is, why don’t they help out by taking a pay cut?

Peter Foster:

... Canadian rock star Governor of the Bank of England Mark Carney ...  was hypocritically flailing away at a straw man. [He] wittered on last week about how fundamentalist capitalism was increasing inequality and hurting the poor ... It is pretty much a rule that anybody who attaches a qualifier to the word “capitalism” is seeking to undermine it.

Carney may be among the most overrated men in recent history. It’s not that he lacks raw intelligence. It’s that the feats attributed to him ... are within the capacity of no man.

An explanation for this dangerous state of mind is contained in a must-read paper by an academic named Slavisa Tasic: “Are Regulators Rational?” Mr. Tasic concludes that they suffer from “illusions of competence” and are entirely blind to the power and subtlety of markets.

New BoC Governor, Stephen Poloz, a breath of fresh air after Carney

Peter Foster:

... first public speech on Wednesday as Governor of the Bank of Canada ...
 
... Mr. Poloz came off as more appropriately modest than his predecessor Mark Carney ...

... former head of the Export Development Corporation, revealed a markedly less hectoring and arrogant style.

... also demonstrated a welcome new humility in noting that macroeconomic models were inadequate, and that the bank had consistently got its growth estimates wrong since the start of the crisis.

...Only on one occasion did Mr. Poloz stray into Mr. Carney’s area of high intellectual allusion.

... Generally, he made all the right noises on Wednesday. Above all he did not come across as somebody who imagines he is the star of the Canadian economy rather than, more appropriately, its Zamboni driver, whose job is to provide the flat surface on which the entrepreneurs and managers can show their creative talents. ...

"The Invisible Hand vs. The Hand of God"

Peter Foster:

The problem is excess of moralism, which bolsters divine regulatory aspirations of those who would paint themselves onto the roof of the Sistine Chapel 

“A banker, a professor and a priest walk into a bar.”  Thus Father Raymond de Souza – to appreciative laughter – began his contribution to last Friday’s panel discussion titled “Banking, Trust and the Culture of Capitalism” ... the “banker,” outgoing Bank of Canada governor Mark Carney. The “professor” was Roger Martin, who is also soon to leave his post as dean of the Rotman School at the University of Toronto.

How Mark Carney wooed his wife

From a wag in the comments to a Telegraph story on Mark Carney:

... By all accounts she's one of the world's great champagne socialists, so I presume the words "I am a banker and have ambitions to make myself exceedingly rich" were sufficient for her to immedately drop her knickers. ...

Speaking of "champagne socialists", the Telegraph had reported:

Mrs Carney, who is the vice–president of Canada 2020, a Left–wing think-tank, is the sister of Lady Rotherwick, whose estate in Oxfordshire plays host to the Cornbury rock festival, which has been attended by David Cameron at least four times.

Mark Carney walks on water because ...

... he's best buds with a fawning pack of Canadian media party suck-ups.  BC Blue compiles the evidence from the Twitterverse and beyond (here and here).  Implicated are the National Post's John Ivison, Maclean's Paul Wells, CP's Bruce Cheadle ... and more.

Macro-meddler Mark Carney

This story in yesterday’s Post had Bank of Canada governor Mark Carney putting "politicians, regulators and chief executives on notice ... that he plans to be a more forceful advocate in influencing public policy and market behaviour ...". In a lunch-time address to a Toronto audience last Wednesday, Carney outlined how he planned to expand his role as BoC governor into meddling with how the financial sector does business.

The story had ‘Peter Foster rebuttal’ written all over it:

...What he appears to be advocating is a brand of populist Keynesianism that suggests that banks are "hoarding" money, combined with the much less saleable notion that individuals are doing damage by being similarly prudent.

... Mr. Carney acknowledged the abject failure of central banks, ministries of finance and international financial institutions in predicting current problems, but drew analogies designed to indicate that valuable lessons had been learned.

... said Mr. Carney, "we must develop early-warning systems with precision and with teeth." So much better than aimless gummy gnawing.

... How? By being more macroprudent. Which means? "Put simply," said Mr. Carney, "a macroprudential approach focuses on the forest, not the trees."

... But could it be that the forest-not-the-trees approach is actually a big part of the problem? Could the very Keynesian conceit that policy wonks can work with stratospheric "aggregates" and get above those messy individuals and companies who actually create wealth be a dangerous delusion? Certainly history suggests so.

... the last thing we want is for governments to tell banks where to lend money.

... Keynesian wonks always speak as if they are delivering advice to benevolent despots and philosopher kings, not terminally-expedient and economically-challenged stimulators such as Danny Williams.

... Mr. Carney, typically, wants "more tools." Monetary policy, he admits, is a "blunt instrument," presumably because it has been unsuccessful in promoting imprudent lending and borrowing. So his new tool is … "advocacy!"

... The Bank’s latest Rube Goldberg-ian tool is a Financial Stress Indicator, FSI, which "is now showing record levels of stress." We would never have guessed.

... a forecasting tool, a bit like those wooden balls that spotted future murderers in the Tom Cruise movie Minority Report. This will presumably spot upcoming "thriftcrime."

... Call me a macro-denier, but I can’t help thinking that just as looking after the pennies means that the pounds look after themselves, so micro-prudence is the only genuine form of that modest virtue. But then Keynesianism perpetually seeks to turn common sense on its head.

See also Mr. Foster’s The ugly spectre of ‘new Keynsianism’.

Peter Foster for governor of the BoC!