Analysts say G-20 summit failed to impress

16 Nov 2008, 1515 hrs IST, PTI

NEW YORK: Describing as a "plain-vanilla stuff" the outcome of the G-20 summit on the financial crisis, analysts have said it left substantive issues to future meetings and
was unable to bridge the ideological gap and articulate a coordinated global response.

For all the talk of action and history-making change, some experts said the outcome was disappointing. "This is plain-vanilla stuff they could have agreed on without holding a meeting," Simon Johnson, an economist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and a former chief economist of the IMF said. "What's new, except that this is the G-20 instead of the G-7?"

The influential financial daily, the 'Wall Street Journal' said, the group left most tough decisions to President-elect Barack Obama who will have to confront a tangle of high-stake economic and regulatory issues immediately after taking office.

"Many of the issues discussed this weekend - including credit rating agency reform, accounting standards convergence, and affirmation of open trade and investment - were issues already being studied," Tim Ryan, President of the Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association, told the Journal. "We hope this summit will provide additional political will to move these important issues forward."

The group vowed to help developing countries get access to financing, including ensuring the International Monetary Fund and other multilateral development banks have sufficient funding. And it said the poorest countries should have a greater voice at the World Bank and IMF.

But an economist at California State University Sung Won Sohn told the Journal, "the devil is in details. Despite the good intentions, progress will be arduous and slow. Each nation has its own agenda complicating matters."