Soros Is Hyping the Existential Threat to Europe

Any instance of political turmoil in one of Europe’s bigger economics triggers predictions of the imminent collapse of the European Union or the euro area. The latest prophet of doom is George Soros, who recently proclaimed that “everything that could go wrong has gone wrong” for Europe. But at such moments, I’m with James Gorman, Morgan Stanley’s chief executive officer, who said the billionaire’s analysis was “ridiculous.”

Soros’s warnings are typical of the “Europe is in danger” school of thought. In a speech to the European Council on Foreign Relations in Paris on May 29, he said the path to oblivion started with the euro zone’s “fiscal retrenchment” after the financial crisis of 2008, which turned a once-equal alliance of nations into a union of creditors and debtors. That led to a surge in populism, which was exacerbated by the mishandled refugee crisis of 2015.