FRENCH ECONOMY STINKS, NOW IMF HEAD THINKS THAT MAKING A BONUS IS SCANDALOUS-GIVE US A BREAK GENIUS!

As usual we get no signals to work with from the IMF and its leadership.

It is good news that financial markets are doing better but 2009 will still be a bad year for the world economy, International Monetary Fund Managing Director Dominique Strauss-Kahn said on Wednesday.

In an interview with France 24 television, he also said the U.S. dollar was likely to remain the world's reserve currency and called the return to generous bonuses for workers in U.S. banks scandalous.

"It's good that financial markets are doing better. It's good that companies are starting to have better results. But 2009 will be a bad year," he said.

"We are only halfway through. The rest of the year will not be good. And the pick-up that we see really only exists as of 2010. So we mustn't get wrapped up in it."

Even when the economy has recovered, unemployment will remain high and rise for some time, he said. Asked whether the IMF's Special Drawing Rights (SDRs), an international reserve asset, could replace the U.S. dollar as the world's main reserve currency, he said: "We are far, very far from having a situation in which the supremacy of the dollar would be contested."

"The reality...is that that the United States is the most powerful economy and so while we can still think about a different system I do not think that the IMF's SDRs would be in a position to replace the immense mass of dollars circulating in the world which are used for international payments," he added.

Asked whether he was concerned about large bonuses which encouraged the kind of risk-taking that helped lead to the financial crisis, he said: "Frankly, I'm scandalised by what I'm seeing."

And does he want to have a say on what business and their directors and COMPANIES DO as far as compensation and bonuses?

Jealous again?

let's take a look at the IMF books and salaries first...what do you say?

Recent bumper profits for banks including Goldman Sachs (GS.N) and JP Morgan (JPM.N) have raised concerns among politicians that banks have not sufficiently changed their business practices in the wake of the financial crisis.