OF SUBSTANCE AND SPIRIT (First of two parts) My father is Serafin Cruz Guinigundo, Apin to his friends, whom everybody thought was a fool for reciting Filipino poetry for hours before an old family mirror one summer afternoon. He commandeered it and carried it down and placed it under a fruit...
OF SUBSTANCE AND SPIRIT (Last of two parts) Last week’s column discussed the vaccine’s effectiveness and safety, given its rather short vetting period. This limited testing time also makes it premature to immediately call for their free-flowing supply. It is incumbent for country leaders to...
OF SUBSTANCE AND SPIRIT (First of two parts) At the beginning of August, 2020, we wrote in this column the imperative to think and act outside the vax. If other nations’ authorities managed to mitigate the pandemic’s ruthless consequences on their people’s lives and livelihood, keep recession...
OF SUBSTANCE AND SPIRIT Last week, the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) surprised everyone by introducing a new logo “in keeping with the changing times.” Since then, social media has been abuzz with comments, feedback, and even memes. The public raised issue not just with the design....
The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) has done enough and should be more careful in dispensing monetary stimulus or risk financial instability, according to an ex-central bank official. “Monetary policy should guard against itself,” said former BSP Deputy Governor Diwa C. Guinigundo,...
OF SUBSTANCE AND SPIRIT National Ocean Service (NOS) of the US Department of Commerce has one interesting distinction between weather and climate and it can never be clearer than “climate is what you expect, weather is what you get.” In the aftermath of Typhoon Haiyan (Yolanda), on-line news...
OF SUBSTANCE AND SPIRIT Diwa C. Guinigundo Donald Trump was at the receiving end of all kinds of insults and shaming available in the playbook, from his economic and trade policies to foreign policy, or the lack of it, to his handling of the pandemic crisis. Yet, not a few were surprised at his...
OF SUBSTANCE AND SPIRIT The broadsheets recently reported that the uncertainty of the pandemic-induced economic fallout led banks to tighten their lending policies. Extracted from the BSP’s own quarterly survey of senior bank loan officers for Q3 2020, the bad news was that most respondent banks...
Some 18 years ago, Umberto Eco (in The Name of the Rose, Foucault’s Pendulum ) echoed a sentiment of many great writers. He stressed that literature creates a sense of identity and community. In his book, On Literature, he said it is unimaginable for Italian to have evolved into the...
OF SUBSTANCE AND SPIRIT Diwa C. Guinigundo (Conclusion) Bad governance has to yield to good governance. The International Monetary Fund is now busy monitoring whether public officials are working for the best interest of their citizenries. Its thrust is to highlight transparency and disclosure...
OF SUBSTANCE AND SPIRIT Diwa C. Guinigundo (Part I) The coronavirus has created a synergy between macroeconomics and epidemiology which explains and predicts infection dynamics and public health containment strategies. This is why the IMF has categorized the pandemic as a crisis like no other. Only...
OF SUBSTANCE AND SPIRIT Diwa C. Guinigundo (Conclusion) How do we assess the three concerns of Fitch? So far, the government has been keeping to its broad policy framework that made our good economic situation of the last 20 years possible. Bayanihan 2 was passed by Congress and approved by the...
