A Template for Understanding Big Debt Crises

by Ray Dalio

Some people mistakenly think that depressions are psychological: that investors move their money from riskier investments to safer ones (e.g., from stocks and high-yield lending to government bonds and cash) because they’re scared, and that the economy will be restored if they can only be coaxed into moving their money back into riskier investments. This is wrong for two reasons: First, contrary to popular belief, the deleveraging dynamic is not primarily psychological. It is mostly driven by the supply and demand of, and the relationships between, credit, money, and goods and services—though psychology of course also does have an effect, especially in regard to the various players’ liquidity positions. Still, if everyone went to sleep and woke up with no memory of what had happened, we would be in the same position, because debtors’ obligations to deliver money would be too large relative to the money they are taking in. The government would still be faced with the same choices that would have the same consequences, and so on.