I think that what you have described in your summary is a "Good Case Scenario". I am concerned that the speakers did not raise the issues of hyper inflation, Chinese threatening to move out of US bonds, the lack of perceived value in underlying economies etc.
The whole world seems to have dumped emerging market currencies for dollars and euros in the last six months. This has caused an unrealistic valuation of said currencies, particularly the dollar. The US moved off the Gold Standard in 1972 in order to allow greater growth. What has happened is that the global GDP has grown so aggressively that it is approximately 50 times greater than the amount of commercial gold in circulation. This means that the value of currency X is purely based on the economy of the country it comes from.
In the US, the value supporting the dollar has gone in the sub prime, the trillions of dollars of default credit swaps etc etc. There are just no assets to back up most of this perceived value. If the Obama government cannot reign in their self imposed inflation, the dollar will decrease in real value very quickly, people (like the Chinese who have over a trillion dollars in US bonds) will move into other currencies or assets and the dollar will collapse in a spectacular way.
This is a fatalistic view and hangs on the cliff edge by the ability of the American government to curb inflation. I don't believe they can because it is far easier to print money and inflate your way out of a crisis than recall that money out of circulation. Secondly Geitner and Summers are in charge and were a massive part of the change in the banking regulations in the Clinton era that allowed the greed of the bankers et al to get us to where we are now. If they can't stop excess inflation or even hyper inflation, the fall will be very, very fast and very, very spectacular
Commenting by HaloScan
