We might have been in the eye of the storm

As the US Federal Reserve attempts to exit from its unprecedented policy of massive purchases of long-term assets, many high-flying emerging economies are suddenly finding themselves in a vise. Currency and stock markets in India and Indonesia are plunging, with collateral damage evident in Brazil, South Africa, and Turkey.

The Fed insists that it is blameless the same absurd position that it took in the aftermath of the Great Crisis of 2008 to 2009, when it maintained that its excessive monetary accommodation had nothing to do with the property and credit bubbles that nearly pushed the world into the abyss. It remains steeped in denial: Were it not for the interest-rate suppression that quantitative easing has imposed on developed countries since 2009, the search for yield would not have flooded emerging economies with short-term "hot" money.

But there is plenty of blame to go around, the Fed is hardly alone in embracing unconventional monetary easing. Moreover, the aforementioned emerging economies all have one thing in common large current-account deficits.