The very fact that the Thais just lowered interest rates again is absolute proof that they believe the economy is in trouble. When we've seen these signs before, it was a precursor to a possible collapse which the central bank was trying to avoid.

Why don't you try reading the couple of news articles that has been published on this site recently, including the one in this thread and try understanding what you've read before you start scaremongering something that is not true. Look closely and you'll see that the interest rate move was regarded as being premptive, look even more closely at the numbers and dig a little and you'll see that the Thai economy and the associated fundamentals are actually quite sound by comparison to many other larger western countries.

You know, you talk about the causes of the 1929 collapse and the recession of the past five years as though they are all caused by exactly the same thing and that is simply not true. The initial decline in output in the United States in the summer of 1929 is widely believed to have stemmed from tight U.S. monetary policy aimed at limiting stock market

speculation, the exact opposite and fractional banking existed five years ago hence the overlending and sub-prime crisis.

Edited October 19, 201213 yr by chiang mai

There had not been the slightest hint that the Bank of Thailand would cut its short-term rate at yesterday's meeting of its monetary policymaking body.

Some "lucky" investors on the SET had a windfall the past 2 days, I'm sure.

And you can bet that there was some high class information changing hands 3-4 days ago.

Much the same as K.(PM) Chavalit soothing the public for a week (assuring the populace that the baht had no problems) before it sailed down the toilet in 1997. A whole lotta' "big" folk did some serious baht dancing during that week.

Edited October 19, 201213 yr by Dap

The guy in the pic looks like Droopy

Well lets see. lowering interest rates achieves what?

1.Higher consumer debt.

2.Housing bubbles.

3.Incentives for governments to borrow more.

4.Punishes savers and pushes them into riskier vehicles.

So essentially it stimulates the debt economy. Hey isn't that like the US? How is it working out for them? How many trillion dollars are they stealing from the next generation? Of course in the US it is mainly about putting bankrupt banks on taxpayer oxygen when the fraudsters should all have been closed and jailed, but hey...

Thank you all for your informative responses. Yesterday I read several articles suggesting that the average life expectancy or cycle of Fiat Currencies is 27 years before failure and every 30-40 years the reigning currency needs to be 'Re-Tooled'. Last US failure was 1971 - something to do with cancelling the convertibility of gold, which I understand enough of to be uncomfortable. I think the system is quite broken. As davejones pointed out though, there's not a bloody thing we can do about it, so to paraphrase Bobby McFerrin I won't worry and live happy. And maybe get myself a bit of debt as a hedge.

FYI, here some details of the Thai current account balance over the past few years, compares quite favorably to the US and other miscreant countries I reckon!

http://www.indexmund...aspx?c=th&v=145

Comparing favourably to the bottom of the barrel isn't something to get too excited about.

FYI, here some details of the Thai current account balance over the past few years, compares quite favorably to the US and other miscreant countries I reckon!

http://www.indexmund...aspx?c=th&v=145

Comparing favourably to the bottom of the barrel isn't something to get too excited about.

Except when the bottom of that barrel is the worlds reserve currency!

FYI, here some details of the Thai current account balance over the past few years, compares quite favorably to the US and other miscreant countries I reckon!

http://www.indexmund...aspx?c=th&v=145

Comparing favourably to the bottom of the barrel isn't something to get too excited about.

Except when the bottom of that barrel is the worlds reserve currency!

So, everyone compares favourably to the world's reserve currency. Does it mean anything?

FYI, here some details of the Thai current account balance over the past few years, compares quite favorably to the US and other miscreant countries I reckon!

http://www.indexmund...aspx?c=th&v=145

Comparing favourably to the bottom of the barrel isn't something to get too excited about.

Except when the bottom of that barrel is the worlds reserve currency!

So, everyone compares favourably to the world's reserve currency. Does it mean anything?

Big sigh.