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Comment by antipaganda | Hacker News Reader

Yes, our finance system lacks sophistication, uhuh... which is why we banned credit default swaps BEFORE the financial crisis, and our banks were never in danger of collapse because of the currency reserves we make them hold. And our foreign debt is miniscule.

So call us primitive if you like, but look at what your sophistication has brought you.

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I think the fact our housing bubble hasn't popped yet goes a long way to explaining why our banks look to be in such great shape. I'm not sure all the patting ourselves on the back is necessarily warranted.

For example, the leverage of the Commonwealth Bank of Australia is about 19:1, where most of their assets are residential mortgages :

http://www.intelligentinvestor.com.au/articles/Commonwealth-...

I find a little scary if charts of house prices such as the following are correct:

http://www.debtdeflation.com/blogs/wp-content/uploads/2009/0...

"... I think the fact our housing bubble hasn't popped yet goes a long way to explaining why our banks look to be in such great shape. I'm not sure all the patting ourselves on the back is necessarily warranted. ..."

I walked 240km (Canberra to Kosciuszko) earlier this year on a bet made on the housing bubble ~ http://www.flickr.com/photos/bootload/collections/7215762379... and the most interesting thing I learned was how broken economic models really are.

Yes, the Australian economy depends heavily on China's at the moment. If China proves unable to maintain its current growth rate, Australia is likely to suffer a pretty severe downturn.

"... Yes, our finance system lacks sophistication, uhuh... ..."

By lacking sophistication, I mean a system of alternative capital (VC) that fully recognises Startups as a serious way to generate wealth instead of say lending money for property development, mining or agriculture.

"... So call [us] primitive if you like, but look at what your sophistication has brought you ..."

I'm Australian ~ http://www.flickr.com/photos/bootload/sets/72157601280899273...

My mistake, I was thinking macroeconomic instead of microeconomic.

You're right, it's yet another aspect of the "Australian invents something, Australia refuses to invest, Australian goes overseas and makes tons of cash" phenomenon.

"By lacking sophistication, I mean a system of alternative capital (VC) that fully recognises Startups as a serious way to generate wealth"

That's definitely changing, e.g Innovation Bay, Startmate, the Sydney Angel Sidecar Fund, and others. VC/Angel investing is not at the same maturity as overseas yet, but it's definitely changing.

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