Surprised Again!-The COVID Crisis and the New Market Bubble

by Alex J. Pollock, Howard B. Adler

Overview

“What will not surprise you is the wisdom, wit, and insight that Alex Pollock and Howard Adler bring to this indispensable guide to financial prophecy. The future may be a closed book, but you must open—and read—this one.”—James Grant, Grant’s Interest Rate Observer

“This book serves as an excellent introduction to modern economics and monetary policy, presenting it cleaner than in any textbook, and with a complete absence of pedantry.”—Law & Liberty

“Surprised Again! will demystify finance for students and give experts a deeper understanding of things they thought they knew.”—Christopher DeMuth, Distinguished Fellow, Hudson Institute and former President, American Enterprise Institute

“A masterful survey of the financial sector and its post-COVID dependence on easy money from the Federal Reserve. This book is the first place to turn for a clear exposition of key financial topics—housing, municipal debt, pension funds, student loans, cryptocurrencies, and more. The reader will be surprised yet again at the extent of financial problems lurking below the surface.”—Thomas H. Stanton, Johns Hopkins University

About every ten years, we are surprised by a financial crisis. In 2020, we were Surprised Again! by the financial panic of the spring triggered by the Covid-19 pandemic. Not one of the 30 official systemic risk studies developed in 2019 had even hinted at this financial crisis as a possibility, or at the frightening economic contraction which resulted from the political responses to control the virus. In response came the unprecedented government fiscal and monetary expansions and bailouts. Later 2020 brought a second big surprise: the appearance of an amazing boom in asset prices, including stocks, houses, and cryptocurrencies.

Alex Pollock and Howard Adler lived through this historic instability while serving as senior officials of the U.S. Department of the Treasury. Their book lays out the many elements of the panic and its aftermath, from the massive elastic currency operations which rode to the rescue by financing the bust with unprecedented government debt, to the consequent asset price boom, which included a renewed bubble in house prices financed by government guarantees. It considers key leveraged sectors such as commercial real estate, student loans, pension funds, banks, and the government itself. It reflects on how to understand these events both in retrospect and prospect.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781589881655
Publisher:	Dry, Paul Books, Incorporated
Publication date:	11/15/2022
Pages:	224
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.40(h) x 0.70(d)

About the Author

Alex J. Pollock is a Senior Fellow of the Mises Institute and the author of Finance and Philosophy: Why We're Always Surprised (Paul Dry Books) and Boom and Bust: Financial Cycles and Human Prosperity. He was Principal Deputy Director of the Office of Financial Research, U.S. Treasury, from November 2019 to February 2021, and has been a fellow of the R Street Institute and the American Enterprise Institute, president and CEO of the Federal Home Loan Bank of Chicago, and a director of CME Group, Ascendium Education Group, and the Great Books Foundation. Pollock’s work includes the study of financial systems and their recurring crises; the politics of finance, risk, and uncertainty; central banking; and housing finance. He is a graduate of Williams College, the Universityof Chicago, and Princeton University, and he lives in Lake Forest, Illinois.

Howard B. Adler is an attorney and former government official. From May 2019 through January 2021, he served as Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Treasury for the Financial Stability Oversight Council, where he was responsible for monitoring the financial stability of the United States during the first year of the Covid-19 crisis. He was awarded the Treasury’s Distinguished Service Award for his efforts by the Secretary of the Treasury. Mr. Adler was a partner for over thirty years in the Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher, LLP law firm, where he served as co-head of both the firm’s Corporate Transactional Practice Group and REIT Practice Group. Prior to joining Gibson Dunn, he served as Executive Vice President and General Counsel of The Riggs National Bank of Washington, D.C. Mr. Adler has also served as the Treasurer of the Washington, D.C. Bar and on the Board of Governing Trustees of American Ballet Theatre. He is a graduate of Johns Hopkins Universityand New York UniversitySchool of Law, and he lives in the Washington, D.C. area.

Table of Contents

1. Surprised Again
2. The 2020 Panic
3. Elastic Currency to the Rescue
4. Financing the Bust: Money Printing and Suppressed Interest Rates
5. A Second Surprise: The 2020 Market Boom
6. A Mortgage Market Built on Wards of the State
7. The Usual Suspect: Commercial Real Estate
8. Banks: Not Their Turn This Time
9. Student Loans: The Worst Lending Program of All Times
10. Municipal Debt in Covid Times
11. Dubious Promises: Pension Funds
12. Money Printing, The $8 Trillion Fed, The $20+ Trillion Central Bank Club
13. New Kinds of Money?
14. Lessons of the Covid Financial Crisis

Editorial Reviews

"A helpful and insightful analysis of current economics . . . The chapters on prime market funds and cryptocurrencies are especially enlightening due to their exploration of regulations, both real and theoretical, that influence their behavior."
—Library Journal

“Pollock and Adler masterfully track governments’ financial response to the global pandemic—and raise critical questions about the future implications of increasing backstops for housing, student loans, pensions, and maybe even cryptocurrencies. A brilliant and clear recounting of the last two years, and a roadmap for the next potential crisis.”
—Winthrop Watson, President and CEO of the Federal Home Loan Bank of Pittsburgh

“Without warning the Covid-19 pandemic swept across the globe in early 2020, fundamentally altering the daily lives of billions. At the same time, the pandemic gave rise to a financial crisis that shocked experts and threw markets into a tailspin. This definitive account by two Treasury Department insiders provides critical insight into the causes of that crisis, how it was abated, and how we might be less surprised by the next one. Suffice it to say, it is a must-read book for economic policymakers, investment professionals, and anyone interested in financial markets.”
—Heath Tarbert, former Chairman, Commodity Futures Trading Commission

“Tired of government bailouts with taxpayer money? Want government programs designed to maximize benefits while minimizing costs to the public fisc? Thought about risk transfers associated with federal intervention in the market? Then read this book!”
—Keith Noreika, former Acting Comptroller of the Currency

“Surprised Again! does a superb job of revisiting the financial meltdown, government response, and economic recovery triggered by the pandemic. The authors infuse this history with thoughtful reflections on the history of central bank crisis management and the political ramifications of the Federal Reserve and Congressional actions taken to combat the Covid crisis. In the end we learn what perhaps is no surprise: bailouts lead to bubbles, and politicians will never let a crisis go to waste.”
—Paul Kupiec, Senior Fellow, American Enterprise Institute

PRAISE FOR ALEX POLLOCK’S OTHER BOOKS:

"Finance and Philosophy should be required reading in economics classes, or before opening an investment account—and by every member of Congress."
—The Washington Times on Finance and Philosophy

“Pollock tells us all we need to know about money and banking, risk and uncertainty, debt and temptation, and science and economics. He delights as he instructs.”
—James Grant, founder and editor, Grant’s Interest Rate Observer on Finance and Philosophy

“Alex J. Pollock isn't angry about the financial panic that erupted in 2008 and knocked the U.S. economy into the worst slump since the 1930s . . . In Boom and Bust, he swiftly identifies the villain―a familiar, sometimes endearing and invariably roguish character known as human nature.”
—The Wall Street Journal on Boom and Bust

From the Publisher

11/01/2022

As former senior officials of the U.S. Department of Treasury under the Trump administration, Pollock (Finance and Philosophy: Why We're Always Surprised) and Adler are qualified to synthesize complex financial behaviors into digestible chapters; the graphs they include are excellent. This book analyzes prime money market funds, cryptocurrencies, mortgages, municipal debt, pension debt, and student loans, in regard to their pre and current pandemic behavior. Each chapter serves as a primer and an update of each category. The authors argue that all finance is political finance, and they believe that predicting financial market behavior is ineffective, since many times those forecasts are wrong or surprising. Salient points are emphasized with a "Dear Reader" salutation that is both annoying and effective, as the examples in those paragraphs are essential for understanding. The chapters on prime market funds and cryptocurrencies are especially enlightening due to their exploration of regulations, both real and theoretical, that influence their behavior. Although the book is designed to be read in sequence, readers looking to delve into these topics beyond daily media coverage will be able to start at the chapter they're most interested in. VERDICT A helpful and insightful analysis of current economics.—Tina Panik

Library Journal