Let’s all move to Canada

The World Economic Forum (WEF) released their Global Competitiveness Report last
week.  Compiled by Michael Porter of Harvard University
and Klaus Schwab of the WEF, it clearly shows the impact of the last year’s
market turbulence.

In the preface, Klaus Schwab sums up the current world
pretty well:

“This year’s Global Competitiveness Report is
being released at a time of multiple shocks to the global economy. The subprime mortgage crisis and the ensuing
credit crunch, combined with rising inflation worldwide and the consequent
slowdown in demand in many advanced economies, has engendered significant
uncertainty about the short-term outlook for the world economy. Global growth
is slowing, and it is not yet clear when the effects of the present crisis will
subside.”

Within the report, they rate how sound the banking
system is for each country of the world based upon the opinions of executives
which creates an index where banks are marked between 1 (insolvent and possibly
requiring a government bailout) and 7 (healthy, with sound balance sheets).

According to the report, Britain’s banking system
has pretty much totally collapsed from being the world’s fifth soundest to
being 44^th, just below El Salvador and Peru.

Oh dear.

So let’s move our money to America?

Nope. The
USA is 40^th, behind Barbados and Namibia.

Who comes out on top?

Canada.

I’m off to join some bears over there.

Here’s the top 10:

1. Canada

2. Sweden

3. Luxembourg

4. Australia

5. Denmark

6. Netherlands

7. Belgium

8. New Zealand

9. Ireland

10. Malta