The Finance Thread

[RamNut]

All this doomsday stuff about a black hole of debt is pretty worrying.

i don't pretend to understand it, but i get the impression from reading this that we had an economy fuelled by responsible lending; then irresponsible lending; then gambling; then irresponsible gambling until almost every player at the table had lost.

(someone must have won?)

now we're running out of chips; we can't borrow any; we can't beg any (by writing anymore IOUs); we've tried to stay in the game by making a load of counterfeit chips in the hope we start to win?

Is that it? 

so why do people keep telling me that the economy is picking up and there are signs of recovery?

is that a load of b.s.?

[Ramarena]

Don't supply the excesses of credit then prices drop and natural demand is allowed to determine the price against affordability with a small consideration against future income. It is no secret that pre-1971 society generally bought out of earned income not leveraged or future income, a good basis for prosperity. This shift to credit be it leased cars or student loans or houses or payday loans... it is all signs of a generation for whatever reason has been duped to handing over the future to the creditors who now determine the price. It is only the government who stepped in to limit the multiples of income people could buy a house for (otherwise prices would be higher as people outbid one another in unearned income - the classic credit bubble!). It seems there is no end to the stupidity (or desperation) of people to take on more debt. It also seems there is no end to the stupidity of lenders to provide the credit (only limited by government). What we need to tackle is the damage this personal debt has on the economy, sucking money from the productive economy (people spend money when they don't have a big mortgage to a bank or student loan repayments) to the largely unproductive economy as these debts have to be serviced (I have posted the 2 key graphs on this I think earlier in the thread, return on debt and velocity of money - record lows!). It is a self-reinforcing loop, except currently the world and central banks think the answer is to create more debt in the form of buying their respective government's bonds (through financial institutions) thus encouraging said financial institutions to lend more to stimulate growth in the economy. You can't create growth at will in a debt based monetary system, eventually the debt strangles the economy! It is absolute madness. Problem is they are still using the same Keynesian models of equilibrium economics which failed to predict the 2008/2009 crisis so who has any faith they know what they are creating now?

I've been arguing this for a few years now. People just look at you gone out whilst thinking they are doing well, as their house went up 5% in a year. Their brains are hardwired to perpetual house price increases being a positive thing, as you say it's not, it's slowly strangling the economy.

 

[Ramarena]

Looking back, you were right in saying this is a 2016 or 2017 affair I think. We'd have seen a blow up by now and we haven't. All I can see (barely thought it possible) is more monetary easing when we were (allegedly) supposed to be starting the fiscal tightening cycle. Now we have Haldane hinting about negative rates!

Since this thread was started China has cut interest rates twice (again today) and will clearly ease all the way down, wouldn't be surprised to see another cut before year end. Japan since announced "Abenomics 2.0" which effectively is making the Japanese bond market a public market, over 50% owned by BoJ by 2018 at today's rate. How does a market crash or find true value if an ever greater % of the market is owned by 1 holder? Draghi has since announced more massive QE by ECB this month. What this does show is that things are getting more desperate by the day, these aren't things you do when things are going well. The bond markets are being rigged and I''ll be honest and say I haven't got a clue what the implications are but it certainly ain't going to be pretty.

You can tell the markets don't know what to make of it either, I am still intrigued by the theory that "the flight to safety" this time round will be to U.S stocks and the dollar (not the bond market and away from anything euro denominated). Yes, they are overvalued but are they the LEAST bad option in the room? If that loss of confidence comes in the bond market the hot money has to go somewhere (more capitalization in it than the stock market), where will it go? Stocks and bonds don't usually crash together, unless we really are talking 1920's...

Big run up in asset/stock prices as people lose faith in government debt (and more QE) to end of 2016, start of 2017 and then an almighty crash? Be interested to know what everyone else is doing at the moment, whether they own bonds, sitting in cash or going to ride out the next wave of QE in equities?

FWIW I am reasonably sure stealth QE is happening in U.S at the moment.

We live in very strange times. Rate decreases boost the market. Talk about rate increases spook the market. Companies announcing job losses often boost the market, etc, etc. 

The truth is that no-one know's what's going on, the traditional economic models have gone out the window, are we in a bear or a bull market? 

I've read discussions about this cycle being very similar to the Great Depression. The markets rocket, then slump, then gain and hold steady, then slump again. The long term constant that they were always heading downwards over a period of time before it all fell apart. Obviously today's economy is a very different beast, however some of the principles still apply and things don't look good. My original thoughts were that domestically we would enter recession in late 2017-18, but I think late 2016-17 could be possible.

A lot depends upon how governments react, we have ZIRP at present, so the only obvious options are more QE or NIRP, if they go down the NIRP route then things could get very messy for the sake of kicking the can down the road a little further. 

At the moment I have no doubt that we are in a slight deflationary cycle if you take out housing costs, which are being manipulated by the government, most of this is being exported by China. Strangely people seem to be taking China's 7% growth figures at face value. Now I could not say what rate their economy is growing, yet I very much doubt it's that I would hazard a guess at the 4% region. Yesterday Maersk downgraded their profit outlook by just over half a BILLION dollars. that's a sure sign that trade is slowing and quickly shipping accounts for up to 90% of trade. 

Domestically the perfect storm seems to be forming. First up is the housing bubble is looking like it's starting to go soft, especially in London. I read the other week that there has been a large amount of capital flight out of London with Chinese and Russian investors, tie that in with Foxton's profit warnings then there could be trouble over the next couple of years and remember what starts in London will expand outwards.

Then there's problems in the steel industry, this is a vital industry for our country. If the crisis worsens then the contagion will spread, steel manufacturers will go down first, then the manufacturers will start to go down, if they go down then the whole economy will be in trouble. And I'll tell you what really angers me, Osborne and Cameron licking the arse of China who are dumping steel here and destroying our strategic industries, but it doesn't stop there, the Steel industry also cites high energy prices as a problem, so what do Cameron and Osborne do? Yes the idiots agree a deal with the Chinese to supply electricity from Hinckly Point at DOUBLE today's prices guaranteed till 2050. Absolute lunacy!

I'm starting to hate those smug Eton ******* more than Tony Blair…. GRRRRRRRR end of rant. 

[SillyBilly]

All this doomsday stuff about a black hole of debt is pretty worrying.

i don't pretend to understand it, but i get the impression from reading this that we had an economy fuelled by responsible lending; then irresponsible lending; then gambling; then irresponsible gambling until almost every player at the table had lost.

(someone must have won?)

now we're running out of chips; we can't borrow any; we can't beg any (by writing anymore IOUs); we've tried to stay in the game by making a load of counterfeit chips in the hope we start to win?

Is that it? 

so why do people keep telling me that the economy is picking up and there are signs of recovery?

is that a load of b.s.?

Does this sound like a recovery:

The Western economies are all generally running deficits. Deficits are funded by sale of bonds (government debt which pays interest), historically to private citizens. Central banks during WW1 and later during WW2 entered the bond market to fund wartime deficits. Except that extraordinary policy was never reversed! In peacetime since 1989 for Japan and 2008/2009 for U.S.A and Europe the central banks have taken this to unthinkable extremes. Though we need to appreciate why (for Europe and U.S) central banks would need to enter peacetime markets and buy such quantities of bonds. There was a huge transfer of PRIVATE debt to PUBLIC debt in particular during 2008/2009 which started this. We tried to defeat the business cycle using extraordinary measures (low interest rates, QE etc.), when loans go bad they must be allowed to default, its the basic premise of capitalism. Delaying this process makes the end result harsher, that is not being a doomsayer, just realistic. So the toxic assets of the private companies in 2008/2009 were effectively transferred to public balance sheets at this time. Government of course then NEEDS to keep interest rates lower than historical averages as it can't afford to pay back the debts it now owes at normal rates (interest rates are the price or cost of money so they distorted money itself in the process). So, how does the government keep interest rates low artificially? By buying its own debt or bonds of course and in some cases being the only bidder for it (QE). Bonds have a yield and a price and they move inversely proportional to each other. As the central banks say "we'll buy any debt you issue and we'll buy X per month" it distorts the price of a bond (there is no "normal" market where risk of default is priced in as the buyer in this case has already announced he'll buy it all). This pushes up the price of bonds and lowers its yield (a function of the interest you receive relative to what you paid for the bond itself). However, this effect now poisons the wider economy. Savers are pushed into BTL or stock investing as they now have no return with interest rates artificially suppressed. It creates a speculation economy and pumps up markets. Pension funds slip into the red as they are invested heavily in bonds for income and interest rates have plunged. Low interest rates pushes up asset prices bought with debt (central bankers wanted to do this - "the wealth effect") and encourages people/businesses to take on more debt. Remember this started as a debt crisis! Businesses don't use the money to invest (record low levels of investment), they instead leverage up buying their own stock in stock buy-backs (they want to profit too from the ponzi scheme - speculation rewards greater). People are loaded up with debt in student loans and housing and don't spend elsewhere meaning the economy experiences DEFLATION in consumer goods, not inflation. So, more debt (QE) is introduced to stave off deflation and promote more lending as the return on the initial debt isn't creating enough growth. You see where this is going?

This is not really a recovery, it is a suspension of reality and the longer reality is suspended the worse the end result. Hopefully I have put across what a vicious cycle we are now in. When I originally posted the thread back in August I believed we might be facing up to the crisis with the potential of increasing interest rates (this would have severe consequences in itself) but we have gone in the opposite direction and I now believe more QE is coming. The difficulty is predicting how this will unravel, as I have said the central banks now own large %'s of the bond market. Normally, when confidence is lost in the debt private citizens would flee and sell their bonds (forcing up yields) - people would demand more interest be paid on the debt if it is considered riskier. Ofcourse we can't really see that now as central banks just buy the lot with their ponzi money. So my conclusion is we are going to have a currency crisis at some point, when and how it plays out, I don't know. Just know this can't continue without consequences.

[Ramarena]

All this doomsday stuff about a black hole of debt is pretty worrying.

i don't pretend to understand it, but i get the impression from reading this that we had an economy fuelled by responsible lending; then irresponsible lending; then gambling; then irresponsible gambling until almost every player at the table had lost.

(someone must have won?)

now we're running out of chips; we can't borrow any; we can't beg any (by writing anymore IOUs); we've tried to stay in the game by making a load of counterfeit chips in the hope we start to win?

Is that it? 

so why do people keep telling me that the economy is picking up and there are signs of recovery?

is that a load of b.s.?

The 1% won as they always will. 

Is that it? No they have still have more QE and NIRP (Negative Interest Rate Policy) to play with. 

In terms of the recovery, yes there's some areas doing well others not so. Any growth is all based upon three things, Housing bubble (debt), consumer debt which is at it's highest level since 2008 and immigration (more people in the country spending more money increases demand  for services, etc). GDP is rising in small amounts, but GDP per capita is still barely above 2008 levels. 

The other interesting thing at the moment is the rampant pay rises we are hearing about. they are at 2.9% if I remember rightly. But that's with inflation at 0%, the BOE says inflation should be at 2% in normal times, so if we were in normal times then pay rises would be at 0.9%. 

It's all if's but's and maybe's, I suppose the real question is do you, your family and friends feel better off/have a better quality of life without having to borrow significant sums of money to feel better off? 

[Ramarena]

We live in very strange times. Rate decreases boost the market. Talk about rate increases spook the market. Companies announcing job losses often boost the market, etc, etc. 

The truth is that no-one know's what's going on, the traditional economic models have gone out the window, are we in a bear or a bull market? 

I've read discussions about this cycle being very similar to the Great Depression. The markets rocket, then slump, then gain and hold steady, then slump again. The long term constant that they were always heading downwards over a period of time before it all fell apart. Obviously today's economy is a very different beast, however some of the principles still apply and things don't look good. My original thoughts were that domestically we would enter recession in late 2017-18, but I think late 2016-17 could be possible.

A lot depends upon how governments react, we have ZIRP at present, so the only obvious options are more QE or NIRP, if they go down the NIRP route then things could get very messy for the sake of kicking the can down the road a little further. 

At the moment I have no doubt that we are in a slight deflationary cycle if you take out housing costs, which are being manipulated by the government, most of this is being exported by China. Strangely people seem to be taking China's 7% growth figures at face value. Now I could not say what rate their economy is growing, yet I very much doubt it's that I would hazard a guess at the 4% region. Yesterday Maersk downgraded their profit outlook by just over half a BILLION dollars. that's a sure sign that trade is slowing and quickly shipping accounts for up to 90% of trade. 

Domestically the perfect storm seems to be forming. First up is the housing bubble is looking like it's starting to go soft, especially in London. I read the other week that there has been a large amount of capital flight out of London with Chinese and Russian investors, tie that in with Foxton's profit warnings then there could be trouble over the next couple of years and remember what starts in London will expand outwards.

Then there's problems in the steel industry, this is a vital industry for our country. If the crisis worsens then the contagion will spread, steel manufacturers will go down first, then the manufacturers will start to go down, if they go down then the whole economy will be in trouble. And I'll tell you what really angers me, Osborne and Cameron licking the arse of China who are dumping steel here and destroying our strategic industries, but it doesn't stop there, the Steel industry also cites high energy prices as a problem, so what do Cameron and Osborne do? Yes the idiots agree a deal with the Chinese to supply electricity from Hinckly Point at DOUBLE today's prices guaranteed till 2050. Absolute lunacy!

I'm starting to hate those smug Eton ******* more than Tony Blair…. GRRRRRRRR end of rant. 

And this is before we get onto the derivatives market which is insane and could well be the trigger for the next crash. 

Keep an eye on Deutsche Bank whilst the U.S banks have an exposure of $250 TRILLION!

[SillyBilly]

The 1% won as they always will. 

Is that it? No they have still have more QE and NIRP (Negative Interest Rate Policy) to play with. 

In terms of the recovery, yes there's some areas doing well others not so. Any growth is all based upon three things, Housing bubble (debt), consumer debt which is at it's highest level since 2008 and immigration (more people in the country spending more money increases demand  for services, etc). GDP is rising in small amounts, but GDP per capita is still barely above 2008 levels. 

The other interesting thing at the moment is the rampant pay rises we are hearing about. they are at 2.9% if I remember rightly. But that's with inflation at 0%, the BOE says inflation should be at 2% in normal times, so if we were in normal times then pay rises would be at 0.9%. 

It's all if's but's and maybe's, I suppose the real question is do you, your family and friends feel better off/have a better quality of life without having to borrow significant sums of money to feel better off? 

Totally agree. It seems a lot of the understanding of Britain's economic health is that house price increase is great (and that it is "earned") and that immigration has been wholly positive. Just on the immigration point, statistically we have almost 2 million more people in the country since the crisis and not a bean more each to show for it, so what gives? The cynic in me thinks the toleration of the massive immigration we have is as much for massaging GDP numbers (and like with inflation people don't notice or make the connection to a declining or none improving standard of living). Japan for all its problems can have flatlining or slightly negative GDP and maintain or increase GDP/capita as its population naturally tapers. Of course your overall economy may get smaller if less people live there but it doesn't mean you get poorer on a person-to-person basis. Although the debt accumulated thus far becomes trickier to pay back with less people so as with Germany their debt load per person has plummeted recently, a nice accounting trick! Just need to put the minions to work now. People are being had. If the solution is importing the third world in to spread debt/pp we are truly shafted. Addressing the symptom not the cause.

[Ramarena]

Totally agree. It seems a lot of the understanding of Britain's economic health is that house price increase is great (and that it is "earned") and that immigration has been wholly positive. Just on the immigration point, statistically we have almost 2 million more people in the country since the crisis and not a bean more each to show for it, so what gives? The cynic in me thinks the toleration of the massive immigration we have is as much for massaging GDP numbers (and like with inflation people don't notice or make the connection to a declining or none improving standard of living). Japan for all its problems can have flatlining or slightly negative GDP and maintain or increase GDP/capita as its population naturally tapers. Of course your overall economy may get smaller if less people live there but it doesn't mean you get poorer on a person-to-person basis. Although the debt accumulated thus far becomes trickier to pay back with less people so as with Germany their debt load per person has plummeted recently, a nice accounting trick! Just need to put the minions to work now. People are being had. If the solution is importing the third world in to spread debt/pp we are truly shafted. Addressing the symptom not the cause.

I find it hard to comment on immigration as I am biased being married to an immigrant. I can't comment on other immigrants, but my wife has put a hell of a lot of money into the U.K via taxation during the last 13 years, certainly more than she has received. 

I know does not add anything to the discussion, I just feel that immigration is a double edged sword. 

[SillyBilly]

I find it hard to comment on immigration as I am biased being married to an immigrant. I can't comment on other immigrants, but my wife has put a hell of a lot of money into the U.K via taxation during the last 13 years, certainly more than she has received. 

I know does not add anything to the discussion, I just feel that immigration is a double edged sword. 

Fair enough, I'd be an immigrant myself in Nevada if it wasn't for my own wife, the offer still stands so far as I am aware so I still push it every now and then! Life invariably shapes our views. I don't think I've be a drain either (hope not) so its not a black-and-white issue.

 

[uttoxram75]

Brilliant stuff on here about the financial crises.

People who campaigned against this type of unsustainable free market ideology over the last 20-30 years were classed as dinosaurs, lefties, traitors, communists etc by the right wing press, still are actually.

Even now, right at the point where most serious economists realise that the western economy built on financial and service industries is doomed to failure, we still get daily rants about how further privatisation is the only way forward.

Public owned manufacturing and utility industries would protect the vast majority against the criminally irresponsible gambling of the stock market get rich quick at any cost spivs who control our press, governments and lives.

 

[PistoldPete2]

Government debt is officially £1.5 trillion. That doubles if you allow for unfunded public sector pensions to more like £3 trillion. Then there's the new State pension a flat rate pension of £150 per week. Not everyone has earned their state pensions yet, but quite a few have even those who are well below State Pension Age. So you can probably add another few £trillion to that to pay for State pensions. 

Whichever way you slice it, £3 trillion, £4 trillion £5 trillion or whatever these are huge numbers. A trillion has 12 noughts after it. £6 trillion would be £100,000 of debt for every man woman and child in the UK.

[SillyBilly]

Brilliant stuff on here about the financial crises.

People who campaigned against this type of unsustainable free market ideology over the last 20-30 years were classed as dinosaurs, lefties, traitors, communists etc by the right wing press, still are actually.

Even now, right at the point where most serious economists realise that the western economy built on financial and service industries is doomed to failure, we still get daily rants about how further privatisation is the only way forward.

Public owned manufacturing and utility industries would protect the vast majority against the criminally irresponsible gambling of the stock market get rich quick at any cost spivs who control our press, governments and lives.

 

This all started in the Anglo Saxon world, the Great Depression was principally caused by fanciful speculation (diverting money away from the productive economy to the financial engineering economy). The U.S and the developed world responded with tougher regulation, the most famous of which was the Glass-Steagall Act which prevented banks having a merged retail/commercial and investment operation. They had to be separate. It effectively said: "You want to gamble, you do it with your own money, distinct from the depositors money". In other words, their investments go bad, they end up bust and out of work, not Joe Bloggs who loses his job and has his life savings confiscated (current situation).

That act was repealed in 1999 after heavy lobbying in the U.S.A by the usual cartel. And it was a Labour politician in Brown with his "light touch regulation" of the City which compounded the problems this side of the Atlantic. We now have corporate socialism where banks will get bailed out by taxpayers and the tax payers then face austerity to pay it back. We don't have capitalism anymore as "too big to fail" is anti-capitalist, it is in fact corporatism. Corporations have infiltrated the U.S.A (read about Citizens United) and they have infiltrated the E.U (Brussels and Strasbourg are a lobbying paradise, the E.U institutions are so opaque it lends itself perfectly to back room deals, money for legislation). Who is really pushing the agenda for TTIP, does it benefit SMEs or the huge corporations? Why is it clouded in mystery? Is the power of national government weakening in globalism and are multi-national corporations now the power brokers? Are corporations the real agenda drivers behind these "free trade deals"? Do they then benefit massively from them, off shore themselves then threaten nations who don't like it with withdrawal? I have my own conclusions to all those questions, I just wonder there the quality journalism is to even be asking them, whatever the answer.

Back on to debt. One of the primary reasons America came out of the Great Depression as an untouchable power was its policy response. Banks went under, 5000 of them. Zombie businesses went under by the tens of thousands. The government chose not prop them up (caused tremendous pain for several years), instead FDR promised a "New Deal" to the American people. He invested in America. He built highways where there were none, he built bridges, schools and universities, the return on this debt was phenomenal. In 2008/2009 we  did the opposite, we bailed the banks out and invested tax payers money in them, not the productive economy. There is no return on this debt which is why there has been no real recovery in the productive economy, just in "financial services", credit default swaps and trading derivatives etc.. Laying high speed broadband cables from Lands End to John O'Groats would have been a better use of that money or perhaps building 3 new nuclear power stations to secure low power costs held domestically and not by the Chinese or French. The bankers should have joined the dole queue. I am not an advocate of huge government spending for the sake of it (the return has to be there) but it seems we made the wrong choice.

[SillyBilly]

Some protesting going off in Lisbon supposedly...

[Rev]

The post 2 back sums the situation up perfectly @SillyBilly imo, barely anything in the mainstream media about TTIP.

 To me it seems one of most dangerous and downright stupid trade agreements we've ever entered into, focusing all the power and rights on the multinationals, to the extent of allowing companies carte blance to sue governments with impunity if they take decisions they don't like, with no costs prescribed to them if they fail! 

It feels like the surrender of sovereign power to business, yet we're sleepwalking into it with barely a murmur from the press and media.

A cosy stitch up between those who run the world, and those who want to, of no tangible benefit to the vast majority of the population. 

[Stive Pesley]

Does anyone have any thoughts on how virtual currencies fit in to all this – or will fit in going forward?

It strikes me that a global economic collapse could easily leave an open playing field for a universal virtual currency to be established.

Bitcoin has come along way in the past 5 years, but there are still barriers to wider adoption. A collapse could remove some of those barriers perhaps?

[Animal is a Ram]

Does anyone have any thoughts on how virtual currencies fit in to all this – or will fit in going forward?

It strikes me that a global economic collapse could easily leave an open playing field for a universal virtual currency to be established.

Bitcoin has come along way in the past 5 years, but there are still barriers to wider adoption. A collapse could remove some of those barriers perhaps?

 

Bitcoin (and all its digital equivalents) is an odd one.

All transactions are public.

But, with the rise in popularity, rise in attacks.

[SillyBilly]

Does anyone have any thoughts on how virtual currencies fit in to all this – or will fit in going forward?

It strikes me that a global economic collapse could easily leave an open playing field for a universal virtual currency to be established.

Bitcoin has come along way in the past 5 years, but there are still barriers to wider adoption. A collapse could remove some of those barriers perhaps?

 

Bitcoin won't kick on for fundamental reasons (not the principle) in my opinion. It has shown itself to be an extremely poor money substitute. You can go as abstract as you want but money simply has to perform the functions of:

1) A good store of value

2) A good and widely accepted medium of exchange

On 1), look at the graph below and the scale, Bitcoin behaves like you would expect a penny share to behave (look at graphs of daily movement too), not a currency. Bitcoin encourages speculation as the money supply isn't sufficient/flexible enough to demand and future money supply is limited (at the rate it is mined) - put simply it doesn't have the liquidity associated with a typical currency, hence you will see it traded like a stock. I could go on here but don't want to get too technical.

2) is effectively underpinned by confidence in the currency (often born of a crisis). It fits the more abstract a currency the less likely it will want to be received in a crisis (or rather the more likely it will hyper inflate). People still flee to precious metals in times of crisis for this reason (and we left the gold standard in practice in 1933 and without question in 1971), they won't exchange resources for something abstract when resources are being heavily competed for. Could Bitcoin stand up to that test? To that end at least paper currency is backed by the printing press of a determined government and its tax base. Bitcoin is backed by computing power? It is okay exchanging it when times are good but that is not the litmus test for a currency. Do you want your pension denominated in it?

I tend to think bitcoin as a bit of a sideline interest. A punt if you want a trade and a bit of novelty to buy some stuff in. It is not sound money and doesn't have the basis of it (my view). Bitcoin has come about due to the loss of confidence in national currencies, those national currencies will fail in time and will eventually reset again based on the principles of sound money. Rinse and repeat. We're playing out a story which has played out so many times before, a debt crisis destroying a currency and a currency reset.

Money will go more electronic like Apple Pay and Google Wallet (?), that is inevitable. So, in that sense, it will be more virtual. Maybe I am behind the times on this phenomena, I have seen some good debates on it both ways.

[SillyBilly]

The post 2 back sums the situation up perfectly @SillyBilly imo, barely anything in the mainstream media about TTIP.

 To me it seems one of most dangerous and downright stupid trade agreements we've ever entered into, focusing all the power and rights on the multinationals, to the extent of allowing companies carte blance to sue governments with impunity if they take decisions they don't like, with no costs prescribed to them if they fail! 

It feels like the surrender of sovereign power to business, yet we're sleepwalking into it with barely a murmur from the press and media.

A cosy stitch up between those who run the world, and those who want to, of no tangible benefit to the vast majority of the population. 

Anyone would think they control the media! Russia Today (forgive the Russian propaganda) is the only mainstream news station I can watch these day.

How we deal with globalism will determine our standard of living throughout the rest of this century, I am convinced most politicians are a decade behind where the world and business has moved on to.

[Ramarena]

Looks like London is ready to pop. Rated the biggest property bubble in the world. 

http://www.theguardian.com/money/2015/oct/29/london-house-prices-most-overvalued-world-ubs

[SillyBilly]

UK GDP Q3 0.5% against 0.6% expected

USA GDP Q3 1.5% against 1.6% expected

Nothing shocking but fits that the economy is slowing not picking up. Yet another reason not to raise rates..