Reconfiguring the Financial Markets

The debut of the new millennium is marked by the increased economic and social imbalances. An important task of economic science is to identify the causes and factors that contributed to the radical transformation of the unfolding conditions of economic activity. The existence of different perspectives to approach the new realities may offer greater opportunities for decrypting the conditions that generated so far unknown developments, as well as for shaping solutions to promote new paths of progress and civilization. The defining with profound implications on the economy and society is represented by the globalization. From this perspective, we have analysed the new dimensions of capital accumulation and economic growth in the context of deregulation and liberalization of the international capital movements. In this context, we have noticed the increasing influence of the financial markets on the economy, the tendency to remove the finances from the real economy requirements, the growing role of external financing using more volatile capital goods, increased competition regarding the access to financing, the significant increase of power of the international capital markets whose characteristic is represented by the increased instability, the implications of the investors’ obsession with an excessive profitableness of their own funds and the expansion of using sophisticated financial products. Realities of today’s financial markets, which are the subject of numerous studies and analysis, have contributed to the association of the arguments that are contesting the thesis on the virtues of self-regulation markets and promoting a new paradigm, within which finances should subordinate the requirements of a balanced and sustained economic growth.cognitive capitalism; the financialization of the economy; financial innovations; volatile capital; institutional investors; derivative products.