Michael Burry thinks the “risk-pricing mechanism” of the global economy is broken and we’re “building up terrific stresses in the system.”
Burry is the central character of “The Big Short,” a blockbuster now in theaters that focuses on the latest financial crisis.
The movie, adapted from the best-selling book by Michael Lewis, tells the real-life story of how Burry figured out that the global mortgage market was on the verge of collapse.
But that was then. Now, he doesn’t see imminent destruction, just the slow build of yet another doom machine.
Here is what he told Jessica Pressler at New York magazine in a recent Q&A.
Where do we stand now, economically?
Well, we are right back at it: trying to stimulate growth through easy money. It hasn’t worked, but it’s the only tool the Fed’s got. Meanwhile, the Fed’s policies widen the wealth gap, which feeds political extremism, forcing gridlock in Washington. It seems the world is headed toward negative real interest rates on a global scale. This is toxic. Interest rates are used to price risk, and so in the current environment, the risk-pricing mechanism is broken. That is not healthy for an economy. We are building up terrific stresses in the system, and any fault lines there will certainly harm the outlook.
So no, we’re not going down now. But eventually, yeah.
As reported by Business Insider