We all now seem to agree that credit in the United States is actually growing during this "credit crunch," albeit at a slower rate than a year ago.  Tyler and others argue that growing credit is actually a sign of the credit crunch.  A credit crunch may show up "counterintuitively as a spike in borrowing" as firms draw on lines of credit.  Contra Tyler this view is certainly "convenient" but I do agree with him that this view is not unfalsifiable.

To wit, let’s falsify it.  The last time we had talk of a big credit crunch in the United States was during the 1990-1991 recession.  Was credit growing during this time as firms drew on lines of credit?  No.  Most of the credit measures that today are growing were in 1990-1991 flat or shrinking.  You can look at the pictures here or look at Table 1 of Ben Bernanke and Cara Lown’s well known paper (Google preview, JSTOR here).  In 1990-1991, for example  business loan growth was zero while today it is well above 10% (the same thing was true in 2001).

Peculiarly, Tyler argues that lack of credit is a leading cause of the crisis but a lagging indicator!   As a result, he needs to resort to non-verified conjectures about credit options to support the credit crunch story.  I have a simpler story, credit is a lagging indicator because it’s credit demand not supply that is the problem.  My story also makes sense of the fact that credit usually lags on the upturn as well – a fact which option value has difficulty explaining.

One error that I believe Tyler is making is to assume that skepticism about the credit crunch implies that one must be downplaying the seriousness of current economic conditions.  Not true.  First, it’s quite possible to have a very serious recession with growing credit – we had this in 82, for example.  Second, if Tyler is correct that the credit crunch is the primary cause of our current conditions then bank recapitalization should restore the economy to good working order.  In contrast, I think the Paulson/Bernanke plan is in trouble because credit demand is shrinking faster than credit supply.

Addendum: In response to Tyler (below) and several people in the comments.  Interest rates are not unusually high, certainly nowhere near as high as you would expect given a "credit crunch."  In fact, interest rates on say 30 year mortgages are falling and are lower now than at the height of the boom and no higher than in 2002 near the beginning of the boom.  I suspect that real interest rates are even lower than nominal rates suggest – inflation expectations anyone?  I wish that more people would present their arguments with data and not with anecdotes.

Mark Thoma gives us eight credit series from the St. Louis Fed. He is somewhat surprised to discover that all show positive growth over last year. I think most people who have heard talk of the credit crunch would also find this surprising. Let’s be clear, however, almost all the series also show declining growth. Let’s also be clear that the financial sector is a huge mess. Furthermore, we are in a recession that is likely to get worse especially because growth is declining around the world.

Contra Tyler (see below) neither the post from Free Exchange nor Mark Thoma’s comments "rebutting" the Minn. Fed study, Four Myths About the Financial Crisis of 2008, are compelling or well thought out.  The Minn. Fed. presented data demonstrating that four widely reported claims about the credit crisis panic are myths – do either of the cited links claim that any of these myths are in fact true?  No.  Do either of the cited links present any data at all on the quantity of credit?  No.  Many people cite prices/rates/spreads as evidence for the crisis but what we ultimately care about is quantity not price.  The Fed. piece had lots of data on the quantity of credit.  Where is the rebuttal?  Does Tyler cite any data at all or lay out his counter-claims?  No.

Consider the major item that these links suggest as evidence of the crisis.  Amazingly, it’s "an unusual spike in bank lending during the
crisis period."  That’s right, an increase in bank lending is evidence of the crisis.  The argument is that lack of credit elsewhere means that firms are drawing on their line of credit at banks.  One problem with this is that Paul Krugman made this argument way back in February when I said that the lack of credit was being overblown.  Thus the "crisis period" keeps changing.  In February, the crisis was in February, now Thoma is saying it’s just the last few weeks.  More fundamentally, the whole point of a line of credit is to keep credit flowing when one source dries up.  A commentator at Thoma’s site nails this one:

Saying that credit availability is so ‘severely’ endangered that
borrowers are forced to utilize credit from banks isn’t the most
persuasive argument. What next?

"Gasoline supplies had withered to the point that I was forced to fill up at Texaco instead of Chevron!" 

Finally, Tyler and both of the cited pieces attack a stupid claim that obviously neither I nor the Minn. Fed. piece made, namely that the interventions by the Fed. have had no effect.  Obviously, they have.  But the story the media and the commentariat are reporting is that there is a credit crunch, credit is frozen, firms are starved for credit, we are on the verge of a Great Depression etc. The story has not been, ‘despite some problems in the banking sector quick action by the Federal Reserve and plenty of alternative non-bank credit has insured that credit continues to flow to nonfinancial firms.’

…stochastic calculus porn…

That’s Arnold Kling on the state of modern macroeconomics.

Back in February I pointed out that despite all the talk of a credit crunch commercial and industrial loans were at an all-time high and increasing.  In September I once again pointed to data showing that bank credit continued to be high (even if growth was slowing.)  At that time I also discussed how bank loans were not the only source of funds for business investment and that many substitute bridges exist which transform and transmit savings into investment.  I suggested that despite the panic the problems which exist in the financial industry may be relatively confined to that industry.   

Three economists at the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis, Chari, Christiano and Kehoe, now further support my analysis pointing to Four Myths about the Financial Crisis of 2008. 

The myths

1. Bank lending to nonfinancial corporations and individuals has declined sharply.
2. Interbank lending is essentially nonexistent.
3. Commercial paper issuance by nonfinancial corporations has declined sharply and rates have risen to unprecedented levels.
4. Banks play a large role in channeling funds from savers to borrowers.

Each of these myths is refuted by widely available financial data from the Federal Reserve.  It’s a short paper, read the whole thing.

None of this means that everything is cheery.  Like most people I think that we are in a recession which is likely to get worse but we need to remind ourselves that recessions are normal.  What is not normal is the current level of panic.  The panic feels to me like an availability cascade.

Hat tip to Mike Moffatt.

Addendum: By the way, I wouldn’t be surprised if credit does start to go down but it will do so because of a fall in the demand for credit not primarily because of a fall in the supply, again an entirely normal aspect of all recessions.

More trouble at Chicago, this time among the econ faculty, regarding the Milton Friedman Institute.  Sad. 

Hat tip to Steve Levitt.

As many people suspected someone was manipulating Intrade to boost John McCain’s stock price:

An internal investigation by the popular online market Intrade has revealed that an investor’s purchases prompted “unusual” price swings that boosted the prediction that Sen. John McCain will become president.

Over the past several weeks, the investor has pushed hundreds of thousands of dollars into one of Intrade’s predictive markets for the presidential election, the company said.

This is big news but not for the reasons that most people think.  Although some manipulation is clearly possible in the short run, the manipulation was already suspected due to differences between Intrade and other prediction markets.  As a result,

According to Intrade bulletin boards and market histories, smaller investors swept in to take advantage of what they saw as price discrepancies caused by the market shifts – quickly returning the Obama and McCain futures prices to their previous value.

This resulted in losses for the investor and profits for the small investors who followed the patterns to take maximum advantage.

This supports Robin Hanson’s and Ryan Oprea’s finding that manipulation can improve (!) prediction markets – the reason is that manipulation offers informed investors a free lunch.  In a stock market, for example, when you buy (thinking the price will rise) someone else is selling (presumably thinking the price will fall) so if you do not have inside information you should not expect an above normal profit from your trade.  But a manipulator sells and buys based on reasons other than expectations and so offers other investors a greater than normal return.  The more manipulation, therefore, the greater the expected profit from betting according to rational expectations.

An even more important lesson is that prediction markets have truly arrived when people think they are worth manipulating.  Notice that the manipulator probably doesn’t care about changing the market prediction per se.  Instead, a manipulator willing to bet hundreds of thousands to change the prediction of a McCain win must think that the prediction will actually affect the outcome.  And if people think prediction markets are this important then can decision markets be far behind?

Hat tip to Paul Krugman.