Interview with Robin Bew, Chief Economist of the Economist Intelligence Unit
Tony McMahon: Hello and welcome to the Global Forecast from the Economist Intelligence Unit. My name is Tony McMahon and as ever I'm joined by Robin Bew. Now Robin, over the summer the data seems to be pointing to a softening in the global economic recovery.
Robin Bew: Yes, that's right. It doesn't come as a huge surprise to us although I can see from the way the markets are reacting it is surprising some analysts. Clearly, there was an enormous amount of stimulus put into particularly the developed world but also some of the emerging markets over the course of the last 18 months or so by policymakers, monetary stimulus and fiscal stimulus and that's starting to be withdrawn, or at least, there is no additional money coming down the pipe and as a result of that, we're seeing growth slow and we had expected this. For many markets our forecasts for 2011 were lower than 2010 already, but the data, of course, is coming as a disappointment to some and you're seeing volatility in the financial markets as a result. So no need to panic. It is as we expected, but nonetheless, I guess disappointing to a lot of investors....
