The bottom has been deep, although I personally can remember longer downturns if my memory serves me right???
How old are you?????
Seriously, the article you posted is the most positive I've read in a long while. I'm with you and will take whatever good news I can find. Since I hold TXN, ADI, SSPIF (DSP), and CYMI (DUV), I'm ready for an upturn.
News out of G-7 is encouraging, too:
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October 4, 1998
G-7 Endorses a Joint Effort
To Stem Global Recession
Dow Jones Newswires
WASHINGTON -- Confronted with the spreading international financial crisis, the Group of Seven industrialized nations pledged to cure their own economic woes, endorsed three recent proposals put forward by President Clinton and spent much time discussing Brazil's growing problems.
G-24 Calls On Wealthy Nations to Reduce Their Interest Rates
The text of the G-7's Communique
Despite these pledges and a statement that low growth now ranks as the world's number one problem, the G-7 apparently couldn't agree on more drastic action such as undertaking a coordinated cut in its interest rates. However, the U.S., Britain and Canada left open the possibility they would cut their own rates further. Speaking in a British Broadcasting Corp. British Chancellor of the Exchequer Gordon Brown hinted Sunday that British interest rates should come down. The decision is up to the Bank of England, however.
Despite the lack of definitive movement, market watchers gave the G-7 an immediate but qualified cheer.
"I think these are all very sound" proposals, said Robert Hormats, the vice chairman of Goldman Sachs International. "The question is in implementation."
"The disunity of the G-7 in past months has been a source of concern. Now that the G-7 has come up with a common perspective, that should boost market confidence," he added.
The G-7 made it clear that while market confidence is one source of concern, the real worry is the relentless spread of the financial crisis well beyond Asia where it began in Thailand more than a year ago.
"The crisis has now reached a point where countries with strong policy regimes are being affected," Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin said. The G-7 is now "deeply committed" to stabilizing the global economy, he added.
Housecleaning
To tackle this issue, the G-7 first promised to get its own house in order. In the case of the U.S., Britain and Canada, the prescription was simply to adjust monetary policy as appropriate.
The G-7 was a bit more stringent with France and Germany, calling on them "to preserve conditions conducive to robust demand, to implement urgent structural reforms and reduce unemployment."
However, the G-7 reserved its most pointed criticism and most specific recommendations for Japan.
"Japan's economic challenges have intensified significantly in recent months, with three consecutive quarters of negative growth and continued weakness in the financial sector," the G-7 said in its joint communique.
The G-7 also reiterated that Japan's current economic woes aren't just hampering the recovery efforts in Southeast Asia but are now threatening the global economy.
In response to this assessment, Japan said it was committed to provide the economy with "sustained stimulus to boost domestic demand led growth" and said it would promptly enact "measures to support viable banks with public assistance."
"We hope that the Japanese government, with parliament, is able to implement reforms as soon as possible," said Deutsche Bundesbank President Hans Tietmeyer.
To ameliorate the economic catastrophe, the G-7 effectively endorsed Mr. Clinton's proposals that the International Monetary Fund set up an emergency lending fund, the World Bank strengthen its lending programs and private business move to invest in developing countries more aggressively.
Canadian Finance Minister Paul Martin said the G-7 "agreed that contingency financing may well be required for countries liable to be sideswiped by contagion."
The G-7 also came down strongly in support of boosting the IMF's lending quotas and suggested the IMF should seek financing from other measures such as the General Agreement to Borrow and the New Arrangements to Borrow.
Despite the opposition to providing new money to the IMF within the U.S. Congress, Mr. Martin said the G-7 hoped it would come around. "We're very confident that the U.S. Congress will assume its responsibility in that area," he said.
Calls for IMF Reform
Mr. Rubin, the U.S. Treasury secretary, urged the International Monetary Fund's policy-making panel to adopt broad reforms of its global economic supervisory system, saying the agency needs a new approach to tackle an "unprecedented" economic crisis.
Mr. Rubin said the IMF must speed up a study on how to improve monitoring of short-term capital flows around the world that have been blamed for disrupting emerging-market economies. It must also require countries that borrow from it to disclose results of annual IMF economic-health inspections.
Japan, meanwhile, in an unusually frank critique of the IMF, called for a wide-ranging reexamination of the workings of the organization, saying it was behind the times in its methods of trying to resolve financial crises.
Japanese Vice Finance Minister Sadakazu Tanigaki said the IMF was created at a time when fixed exchange rates were the norm and capital movements more limited.
"The Fund's traditional prescription which combines fiscal balance improvement with tightening of monetary policy is no longer appropriate in every instance," Mr. Tanigaki said.
He said asking a country with a fiscal surplus to tighten further or adopt a high interest rate policy to protect its exchange rate level "could end up with more negatives than positives -- inviting a downturn in the economy and further erosion of confidence."
World Bank Lending
In addition to the IMF proposal, the G-7 applauded Mr. Clinton's call for the World Bank to sharply expand lending and to help private businesses move into emerging markets through such measures as loan guarantees.
The effort to push more money into the developing world is clearly aimed at partially offsetting the capital flight these countries have suffered.
"We reaffirmed our concern about the extent of the general withdrawal of funds from emerging markets," the G-7 said in its communique.
"We all agreed -- as we have been doing over the past year -- to continue to support reform in developing emerging market countries, including the importance of providing additional financial assistance where necessary," Mr. Rubin said.
After the G-7 officials broke up to speak to journalists, they got back together again at Blair House, an official U.S. residence near the White House, to discuss possible measures to solve the problems facing Brazil.
There's broad agreement among officials attending the annual meetings of the IMF and World Bank that Brazil is a bulwark for preventing the financial market contagion from spreading throughout Latin America.
Brazil, the latest country to succumb to the world economic crisis, is holding elections Sunday. Officials have made clear that they would be willing to provide Brazil with an aid package if the government promises to keep up reforms and continues to cut its budget deficit.
At their post-meeting press conference, some G-7 officials including French Finance Minister Dominique Strauss-Kahn expressed support for President Cardoso's efforts.
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