“Shocks could be coming from the central banks themselves because they’re tightening more quickly than previously anticipated,” Tobias Adrian, director of the Monetary and Capital Markets Department at the IMF, said in an interview. “We worry that we could see a sell-off of sizable magnitude, given the level of stretched valuations.”
Complicating the central banks’ calculus, he said, is the emergence of inflation pressures “unlike anything we’ve seen before.”Article content While the IMF agrees with the Fed and other central banks that the burst of inflation will likely prove temporary, “there’s quite a bit of uncertainty” around that forecast, Adrian said. That raises “some question marks” about how policy makers would respond to a financial-market meltdown.“Equity price misalignments” are widespread as the run-up over the last 18 months has left shares elevated relative to economic fundamentals.
Prices could fall “substantially in the event of a sudden reassessment of the economic outlook or unexpected policy changes.”“Downside risks to house prices appear to be significant. In a worst-case scenario, the house price decline over the next three years is estimated to be about 14 per cent in advanced economies and 22 per cent in emerging markets.”Article content
One silver lining: While home values look about as stretched as they did before the 2007-08 financial crisis, the banking system is in much better shape than it was back then. according to the Fund.
The same IMF who fudged the books for China.
Talk about our own nation, Chinese is a major threat to our housing market and our culture, thanks to mass immigration of unfriendly.
Chinese Chinese Chinese