There are growing indications that the Iranian banking system is in crisis, weighed down by a proliferation of non-performing loans. Although there is no timely financial reporting to speak of in Iran, a number of recent news stories suggest to me that the country’s banks are in a great deal of trouble.

Central Bank of [Read more...]

One of the things that has been keeping me awake at night lately is Japan’s horrendous government debt burden. This is already more than 170% of GDP and will only keep rising as the budget deficit surges this year and GDP plummets. I forecast government debt reaching 250% of GDP by the end of 2018, [Read more...]

Surprise, surprise, there is (yet again) trouble brewing in Nigeria. Nope, this time the spotlight is not on the Niger Delta rebels, but on something potentially far more deadly: the country’s banking sector. Sounds familiar? Indeed, as attentive Risk Watchdog readers might remember, way back in January I mentioned how opaque reporting standards and large [Read more...]

Scenario planning is an essential element of risk analysis and management, and my colleagues and I at Business Monitor International constantly have to envisage potential chains of events in economies, financial markets, and the political arena. With this in mind, I thought I’d take the opportunity to comment on a book I read recently: 7 [Read more...]

Moldova is in the midst of yet another political crisis. By this, I actually mean that the country has entered a new phase of a pre-existing crisis – a crisis that yields valuable lessons on the broader significance of political institutions to a country’s risk profile. Fortunately, this new scene in the ongoing drama has [Read more...]

With Bank of America and Citi Group’s share prices in renewed meltdown mode, the risk of a further collapse of a major Western bank has again made international headlines. While far less publicised (yet by no means less important for the people concerned), I believe that there is also a potential banking crisis brewing in [Read more...]

Latvia is the newest victim of the credit crunch. This is not official. No formal application has been made for an IMF bail-out package, nor has it made the front pages of any major newspaper of record on the continent. That said, with the economy contracting by 4.2% in the third quarter (down from 10.1% [Read more...]