Good reasons for optimism today

The world will see a more adequately prepared conference on the world economy in London than its historical counterpart amid the despair of 1933.

Despite previous reports about the difficulties of working with each other, the Group of 20 (G20) financial policy-makers demonstrated some "spirit of cooperation" by agreeing on a set of common tasks that can accommodate various nations' policy preferences relatively coherently.

The meeting of finance ministers and central bank governors last week was to pave the way for the G20 summit scheduled for April 2.