She co-founded a website called The Automatic Earth in January 2008 to write about big picture financial issues, including a coming credit crunch.
Readership of the website grew to five million people a year and, in 2010, she embarked on a global speaking tour which she remains on until now.
In Tauranga to speak last night, Foss met the Bay of Plenty Times yesterday morning to present her case.
The world is at the top of a large expansion cycle which has been largely created by a giant financial bubble, she says.
"Everything looks really good at the top of the bubble and people say 'this is wonderful, it can only get better', when actually there's nowhere to go but down."
The European sovereign debt problem was like a growing hole in a bucket and pretty soon the European [central] bank would not be able to pour in as much money as was falling out the bottom of the bucket.
"It can happen quickly, that's what we saw in Cyprus, it can happen in a week."
New Zealand was not immune to sickness in the global financial system and would not be safe just because it was a large primary industry producer. Global trade was built on credit and, when the credit bubble burst, New Zealand would lose much of its export earnings.
"New Zealand has made a lot of short-term choices, it's the most globalised country in the world pretty much, but that's a huge problem when trade is going to take a big hit and you won't necessarily be able to export or import, and then the question is what on earth does New Zealand do on its own?" Foss asks.
"It's going to be a big adjustment and a lot of the people who put all their eggs in the basket of continued global expansion are going to find they lose all those eggs."
Foss said her advice to individuals was to start building their levels of self-sufficiency.
At a corporate level, businesses needed to think in terms of local supply chains and local distribution networks.
"Don't put all your eggs in the export basket, think about other aspects to your business," Foss says. "You have to have cash on hand, you have to have liquidity, so the shortest-term government bonds may be an option for holding liquid reserves if you don't want to have too much in the banking system."
