Bill Witherell's Blog

Chief Global Economist
bill [dot] witherell [at] cumber [dot] com ()

Bill Witherell joined Cumberland Advisors as Chief Global Economist in November 2005 and became a Portfolio Manager in December 2005. He also is a Senior Consultant for Finance and Corporate Governance to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). From 1989 through September 2005 he was OECD's Director for Financial and Enterprise Affairs. He joined the Secretariat of the OECD in Paris, France, in 1977.

Dr. Witherell is a graduate of Colby College and holds an M.A. and a Ph.D. in Economics from Princeton University. Dr. Witherell began his career as a business economist with Exxon and Esso Eastern (1967-73), where he held positions in the economics, treasury and corporate planning functions. He moved to the international economic and financial relations field in 1973 with positions first in the U.S. Department of State and then in the Department of the Treasury (1974-77) as Director of the Office of Financial Resources and Energy Finance.

Dr. Witherell currently resides in North Grafton, MA. He is a past Chairman of the International Roundtable of the National Association for Business Economics, a member of the Boston Economic Club and the Westborough MA Rotary.

The Risks Facing European Banks

Last week, European Central Bank (ECB) President Mario Draghi, responding to market concerns that had battered the shares and bonds of Eurozone banks, insisted that “We have to acknowledge that the regulatory...

Brexiting the EU - Update

After two days of lengthy and intensive negotiations, UK Prime Minister David Cameron returned from Brussels with a new settlement, having secured “special status” for Britain within the European Union. This achievement should improve somewhat...

China!

When the markets opened on the first market day of 2016, we were glad that we had not re-entered China's equity markets since we sold our China positions last August. We were also glad that we did not hold any emerging-market positions in our International and Global ETF Portfolios. We did consider participating in the fourth-quarter recovery in China's markets engineered by the...

Global Growth Tensions Reflected in Diverging Data Points

Confirmation of slower growth in China in August triggered further tumbling of global stocks on September 1st. The first of the month is when we get the Purchasing Managers’ Indexes (PMI) from Markit...

China and Global Market Turbulence

Global financial markets have just gone through ten market days of high turbulence, blamed widely on developments in China. This note discusses (in increasing order of their importance for US investors) the bursting of China stock...

The Yuan Devaluation: Unexpected But Economically Sensible

August 10th’s announcement by China that it would “devalue” the yuan (also called the renminbi), caught markets and us by surprise as China had been keeping its currency within a narrow 2% band against the US...

Prospects for the Euro After the Greek Tragedy Concludes

As the situation with respect to Greece developed in recent days, the euro fluctuated within a surprisingly narrow range versus the US dollar. During the second quarter, the euro actually strengthened as prospects for...

Reflections on France

Having lived in France (where I was OECD’s Director for Financial and Enterprise Affairs in Paris) for some 28 years, I try to touch base there once a year. I have recently returned from three weeks visiting Paris and...

Teetering on the Brink

When both sides engage in brinkmanship in a power contest and find themselves at last genuinely at the brink, the chances for an "accident" which neither side wants have rise substantially. That is where Greece and its creditors...

The Final Act of the Greek Tragedy?

Both sides in the Greek drama cling tenaciously to their dangerous but all-too-predictable brinkmanship tactics as the clock approaches midnight. In Berlin, a summit meeting of the leaders of the main creditors...

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