WELCOME

Hi,
The aim of this blog is to accrue information that may be of help to you & links to other sites I have found of help, including sites run or managed by friends and associates.
Do send me a message of anything you feel would help.
Regards, Greg L-W.
Greg_L-W@BTconnect.com

Thursday 30 October 2008

Government Finance Is Nothing More Than Criminal Incompetence!! #A)^* (G016)

#A06* - Government Finance Is Nothing More Than Criminal Incompetence!! (#A06*) - (G016)

IsItFair
An Independent , Nationwide Campaign Calling for the Reform of the Council Tax System. Please Visit http://www.isitfair.co.uk/
Council Tax Payers to bail out Local Authorities?

1. No, no, no!
Local authorities have more than £1bn tied up in Icelandic banks. With the fear that this money might not be returned, the Local Government Association (LGA) went running to the Treasury asking for help and protection.

It has also emerged that since September 2007, rankings by credit reference agencies should not simply be taken at face value. This was the Chancellor’s advice. However, the lure of high interest rates was too much to resist for some. To make matters worse, some of this money has been borrowed.

We have also seen the start of the ‘no blame game’. No one has done anything wrong, acted improperly or irresponsibly. Oh no. Local authorities have all followed the guidelines set down by John Prescott in 2004. How reassuring.
In total, it is estimated that local authorities have £8bn invested globally. Kent County Council alone has £163m invested. The total of all investments by public bodies globally is estimated at £30bn.
To make matters worse, it has also emerged that many local authority finance directors are baffled and confused by the money markets and have to take advice from external consultants about the investment of tax payers’ money.

2. £30bn invested globally
If local authorities have £8bn invested globally, it begs the question ‘why are they holding so much?’ This does not include council reserves of a further £11bn. These two amounts alone total £19bn which at a conservative annual interest rate of 5% generates £550m of interest income, which is nearly half of the annual increase in council tax for 2007-08.
Council tax receipts are now nearly £25bn per annum, and rising. Year after year, increases in council tax outstrip both inflation and wage increases. Yet, year after year we are told that councils are ‘cash strapped’ and threaten to cut services unless council tax goes up.
With at least £19bn in reserve or invested, councils are anything but ‘cash strapped’.

3. £25bn annual council tax
Some unnamed, so called "experts" are reported as stating that if local authorities don’t get their £1bn back then council tax payers will have to pay this again. Who are these "experts" and what right do they have to make such an assumption?
The consumption of public services is available to all, not just council tax payers. When you call the police or fire service, they don’t refuse to help you if you are not a council tax payer.
Any loss that any local authority may suffer, and it is too early to know if this will be the case, should be met by the Government. This problem is the result of local authorities following national guidelines. The Government can find £50bn to bail out the banks. Another £1bn really won’t make any difference. If the Government refuses, then there are plenty of reserves to fall back on locally, even if this means re-prioritising some spending decisions.

4. Public Finances are in "good shape"
Gordon Brown stated this in the Commons this week (w/c 20 October 2008) in order to justify his decision to spend his way out of recession. If this is really the case, then why are local authorities claiming to be "cash strapped"? These two statements are contradictory and require clarification. Local authorities have benefited from over 10 years of above inflation rises in their council tax receipts and now receive £25bn p.a.. On top of this they receive a further £10bn plus in fees and charges and continually claim to be saving millions of pounds in efficiency savings. Yet, every year, we get the same tired old message when they pass the ‘begging bowl’ round – ‘council tax must rise or services will be cut’. The Government allows them an annual 5% increase before they consider applying any cap yet still they want more. Clearly, something is very wrong – spending would seem to be out of control.

5. Helping hard working families
We have been told time and time again by Gordon Brown that he is doing everything he can to help hard working families and that he is acutely aware of the problems that families face. Yet, this message seems to have failed to reach the local authorities who are already announcing even more council tax increases for next year. Do these local politicians live in a parallel world? Are they so detached from reality that they have not noticed the credit crunch, the huge rises in the cost of oil, food, electricity and gas? Council taxpayers have to bear the brunt of these massive price increases and adjust their budgets accordingly. It is now time for profligate local authorities to rein in their spending too. Helping hard working families does not mean increasing their taxes.

6. Cash Strapped Council Taxpayers
What will happen when the council taxpayer runs out of money? Many thousands already have to make hard choices when managing their meagre incomes. The economic climate is certainly not going to get better or easier in the short term. It has been said many times already that the current level of council tax has reached its limit of acceptability. Another year of inflation busting increases may see history repeating itself as all peaceful means of encouraging the Government to reform local authority funding and to make it fairer have simply been ignored and treated with utter contempt.

7. No more council tax increases
In Scotland this year, the SNP in consultation with all local authorities achieved a freeze in council tax, thus proving beyond all reasonable doubt that with the right political will, council tax increases are avoidable.
In London too, Mayor Boris Johnson has also announced a freeze on the GLA precept to 2010/11 at the earliest. His longer term aim is to actually reduce the precept by cutting out waste. The GLA precept in London has rocketed by 152 per cent since 2001.
Since its introduction in 1993, the annual amount of council tax raised has increased by 300 per cent, from £8bn to 25bn.
It is now time for the Government to put a stop to this incessant, year on year inflation busting increases. People are sick and tired of seeing their hard earned money being taken away from them by local authorities who think that they can spend it better. Much of this is simply squandered. For example, one council spent £5k on squash court signs in Braille for blind people only to discover afterwards that blind people don’t play squash! Perhaps this is because they can’t see the ball, which is blindingly obvious even to a blind person. How stupid is that?

8. Action is needed now
Write to Gordon Brown, your MP and Local Authority Chief. Tell them that this decade of irresponsible council tax increases and spending must stop. Where known, quote examples of waste in your locality. The present system of council tax has been exposed as fundamentally flawed and should be replaced with a fairer system based on ability to pay.
Tell them, in no uncertain terms how you have to adjust your budget to make ends meet. If we all ran our home budgets the same way as Government has run theirs, we’d all be bankrupt. We can’t simply turn to our neighbour and expect (demand) that they pay for our poor financial mismanagement. These politicians need to be told and told and told until our message gets through.
Yours in the cause,
Christine
c@isitfair.co.uk
October 2008
Available (details on request):
car stickers, envelope stickers, Isitfair Introductory Booklet.Isitfair receives no funding from any organisation and survives on donations, gifts of stamps and on stationers’ and printers' generosity.

9. None of these figures above includes the sale of approximately 600 tons of gold at the very bottom market value when at very least gold has risen in value since the economically illiterate idiot Brown’s mean average income price per ounce by £300 per ounce!CONSIDER:
£300 x 16ozs. x 2,240lb x 600 £6,541,200,000 Loss incurred selling off OUR Gold.


10. This Government is Criminally insane in economic terms. This also is separate from the £9,111 per second debt which Prudence has incurred for the peoples of these United Kingdoms Plus of course the huge losses he has orchestrated seeking to find ways to credibly devalue the British Pound to dupe people into acceptance of having our economy run by undemocratic foreigners The Euro through the ECB.

11. The incredible tragedy is that the opposition are such utter fools

This looks like the hysteria of over tired 3 year olds at a party!
The B.O.A.Ps.!
Bit Of A Pervert
Bit Of A Pratt &
Bit Of A Plonker!

Do YOU find the mess Government has made remotely funny?
12. NOT Once has Her Majesty’s Government,
be that front bench or loyal opposition, spoken out in ANY comprehensive or constructive way to address the utter, total and complete incompetence and irresponsibility of The Treasury during 11 years of criminal incompetence.

13. The Tories today had the opportunity of selecting
a debate for the House of Commons and minded of the Credit Crunch, the oncoming Currency Tsunami, the burgeoning Unemployment, the catastrophic repossessions, the Bankrupcy rate, the inability to fund the NHS drug requirements, the ……..What topic do YOU think the Tories found the most important that required a debate?Yes – you’ve guessed it Theresa May chose to have a debate on whether the BBC correctly handled the vapid, repetitive, childish behaviour of the sordid little rip off merchant Johnathan Ross correctly – well that will change the world I guess and save millions of lives!

14. Then again one has to realise it was the Government,
having incurred a debt of around £2Trillion in 11 years due to economic dishonesty and incompetence without a single solitary debate – Yesterday they had their first full debate on the non science and dishonest propaganda of Global Warming on the very day when for the first time since 1922 snow fell in London in October!

15. Next we have the Racist Police Organisation acting so typically
– they invited David Davies to address their Conference and found they had gone to the wrong address and pulled the wrong geezer! Instead of being addressed by the ex shadow David Davis they had by mistake invited Special Constable David T.C. Davies MP for Monmouthshire who in robust fashion and with complete accuracy and honesty pointed out that the organisation was racist, unacceptable and outside of the law, with quotes from their own web site to prove it – including pointing out that it was counter productive and anti police – Oh yeah they were a coloured organisation – mostly looking black as thunder at the exposure to the truth, red with embarrassment having pulled the wrong geezer and utterly stupid having shown just how dishonest and corrupt they were!Well done David! However instead of being promoted David will no doubt be ordered to scurry back to parliament either to behave like a fool as shown in the pictures above or debate something of world shattering importance like the imbecilic little Johnathan Ross!

16. The Government are like a dysfunctional family of Liverpool scallies in a soap opera – aware the bailiffs are drawing up the papers to seize the house & shinny cars whilst the occupants are spending money like drunken sailors on credit cards they have stolen, meanwhile the entire family squabbles over who controls the TV remote control and which of the 500 crass, foul languaged programmes, that now constitute TV entertainment, to watch!
BUT NOR ARE


THE BLUE LABOUR TORIES
or
THE IDIOTIC & MUDDLED LIB. DIMS.

3 LEADERLESS INCOMPETENTGROUPS OF CLOWNS
OBSCENELY OVER PAID!

& Johnathan Ross?


17. Perhaps someone can tell us how Anthony Charles Lynton Blair came
to office too broke to pay for minor repairs in his constituency house,with a wife with a VERY average career as a part time Barrister a father in lawon the fiddle on benefits and 4 children to fund.1997 > 2007 on a salary of around £175,000 as Prime Minisyter with a Free House2007 Blair left office with a property portfolio running to many £Millions and with an estimated net worth of approaching £1/2Billion.HOW did this skin crawlingly odious pervert and his revolting doxy manage to make so much money whilst acting as both Party leader and Prime Minster – I can not see any way he could have made so much money honestly but that leads one to remember he WAS First Lord of The Treasury!!”Draw your own conclusions!

18. NEVER forget in 1997 Gordon Brown and the claque
of anti British crooks and useful idiots he and Blair surrounded themselves with took over responsibility for the British economy taking over balanced books – today 11 years later Britain is in debt to the tune of approaching £2 Trillion which if counted at one Pound per second would take 63,000 years to count YES Sixty Three Thousand Years!

19. It is now probable that by 2010-12
Britain is likely to have uncheduled power outs due to the incompetence of the Government to implement a programme of building Nuclear power stations as the backbone of a clean fuel industry and building coal fired power stations and trash burner systems with chimney scrubbers – the ONLY way to provide sufficient power for survival alongside the omni present and readily available Oil supply which seems on EVERY scientific model, based on discovered resources so far, to be sufficient for mankind’s needs for over a century.

Regards,
Greg L-W.
01291 – 62 65 62

MAY I SUGGEST – since there is no political party of repute advocating or campaigning for withdrawal of these United Kingdoms from the EU and restoration of our independent sovereign democracy, with Justice & the right to self determination in a free country:

Write Upon Your Ballot Paper:

LEAVE THE EU

Tuesday 14 October 2008

#A05* - Blowing Away The Myths of GM Too!!!

#A05* - Blowing Away The Myths of GM Too!!!

The financial crisis could be the euro's death knell ... and even end the shambolic EU

& What would GM crops mean for British farmers?

Hear Canadian Farmer Percy
Schmeiser talk about the effect that
growing GM crops commercially is
having in his home country

Listen to Percy’s astonishing
experiences about the knock-on
effect of GM contamination, which
have gained him worldwide
recognition

Debate what GM crops could
mean for British farmers and the
right to choose food free of GM
contamination
Percy Schmeiser, Canadian farmer and recipient of the
Internationally recognised ‘Right to Livelihood Award’ 2007

For more information see www.percyschmeiser.com
Tour organised and supported by GM Free Cymru, GM Freeze,
Family Farms Association and Small Farms Association
See overleaf for venues
Percy Schmeiser Tour
2008 Venues

NORWICH Wednesday 22nd October, 7.30pm
Sports and Conference Centre, Easton College, Easton,
Norwich, Norfolk NR9 5DX.
Tel: 07958 793298

LINCOLN Thursday 23rd October, 7pm
Riseholme Conference Centre, University of Lincoln,
Riseholme Park, Riseholme, Lincoln LN2 2LG.
Tel: 07751 112303

DRIFFIELD Friday 24th October, 7pm
The Bell Hotel, Market Place, Driffield, East Yorkshire YO25 6AN.
Tel: 01482 862085

ABERYSTWYTH for FUW members ONLY. Monday 27th October, 2pm
IGER Centre, Plas Gogerddan, Aberystwyth SY23 3EB.
Tel: 07879 664 703

DORCHESTER Tuesday 28th October, 7pm
Kingston Maurward College, Dorchester, Dorset DT2 8PY.
Tel: 01258 861023

LONDONWednesday 29th October, 3.30pm
Friends House, 173 Euston Road, London NW1 2BJ. Space is limited.
To reserve your place please contact eve@gmfreeze.org or
phone 0845 217 8992

LONDONWednesday 29th October, Gaia Evening 6:30-10pm
Booking Essential. £10, includes drinks and light buffet from 6:30 at
18 Well Walk, Hampstead, NW3 1LD, followed by the talk in Burgh House.
phone 0207 428 0055 for details.

Percy will be accompanied by a scientist at a number of the venues listed
See www.gmfreecymru.org for further details about the tour.

PLEASE NOTE:
I have removed promotional material from the details above for Friends of the Earth & Gaia Foundation as although I am opposed to GM Crops on the grounds of logic, science and democratic principles I consider Friends of the Earth & Gaia Foundation to be irresponsible, illogical, dishonest and corrupt in the promotion of junk science and dishonest propaganda unfounded on scientific facts with peer review in the field of Global Warming & Climate Change and their opposition to clean energy through Nuclear Power and their promotion of massively environmentally damaging concepts of power production such as Windmills etc.

Which have absolutely no grounding in factual science as standing any chance of providing mankinds needs.I uphold the efforts of Percy Schmeiser to oppose GM products and terminator seed concepts and the right of corporations and individuals to patent any part of the DNA of any living natural product or life form.

I deprecate his association with Global warmists and self promoting individuals and organisations exploiting fear and ignorance.

You may find the following article of interest:
QUOTE from..Dr Vincent Gray, a member of the UN IPCC Expert Reviewers Panel since its inception, calls for abolishing the IPCCExcerpt:
The whole process is a swindle, The IPCC from the beginning was given the licence to use whatever methods would be necessary to provide "evidence" that carbon dioxide increases are harming the climate, even if this involves manipulation of dubious data and using peoples' opinions instead of science to "prove" their case.

The disappearance of the IPCC in disgrace is not only desirable but inevitable. The reason is, that the world will slowly realise that the "predictions" emanating from the IPCC will not happen.

The absence of any "global warming" for the past eight years is just the beginning.

Sooner or later all of us will come to realise that this organisation, and the thinking behind it, is phony. Unfortunately severe economic damage is likely to be done by its influence before that happens.

I have been an "Expert Reviewer" for the IPCC right from the start and I have submitted a very large number of comments on their drafts. It has recently been revealed that I submitted 1,898 comments on the Final Draft of the current Report.

Over the period I have made an intensive study of the data and procedures used by IPCC contributors throughout their whole study range.

I have a large library of reprints, books and comments and have published many comments of my own in published papers, a book, and in my occasional newsletter, the current number being 157.

I began with a belief in scientific ethics, that scientists would answer queries honestly, that scientific argument would take place purely on the basis of facts, logic and established scientific and mathematical principles.Right from the beginning I have had difficulty with this procedure. Penetrating questions often ended without any answer.

Comments on the IPCC drafts were rejected without explanation, and attempts to pursue the matter were frustrated indefinitely.

Over the years, as I have learned more about the data and procedures of the IPCC I have found increasing opposition by them to providing explanations, until I have been forced to the conclusion that for significant parts of the work of the IPCC, the data collection and scientific methods employed are unsound.

Resistance to all efforts to try and discuss or rectify these problems has convinced me that normal scientific procedures are not only rejected by the IPCC, but that this practice is endemic, and was part of the organization from the very beginning.

I therefore consider that the IPCC is fundamentally corrupt. The only "reform" I could envisage, would be its abolition.The two main "scientific" claims of the IPCC are the claim that "the globe is warming" and "Increases in carbon dioxide emissions are responsible".

Evidence for both of these claims is fatally flawed.-----------------------------------The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is supposedly the last word on global warming.

Those who promote global warming hype declare IPCC reports to be peer reviewed science, and peer reviewed science to be infallible. On that basis, critics are attacked for putting themselves above the unquestionable word of science.But the IPCC is controlled by political hacks who reshape the science for their agenda.

There is no place in science for arbitrary authority—least of all a subject as complex as climate change.Alexander Cockburn, editor of Counterpunch, is a journalist who describes the position of the critics fairly well. He says, "To identify either the government-funded climate modellers or their political shock troops, the IPCC's panelists, with scientific rigor and objectivity is as unrealistic as detecting the same attributes in a craniologist financed by Lombroso studying a murderer's head in a nineteenth-century prison for the criminally insane."

http://www.counterpunch.org/cockburn05122007.html Frauds always base their position on something which they claim to know but can't describe. You are supposed to trust them.Constructive persons always describe the evidence, or they don't say it. They expect each person to do his own evaluating.Why should a bunch of idiots who have never taken a science course in their lives tell people what to think about global warming?

Do they know something others don't know?

Hundreds of years ago, when there was a theocracy, and social structures were frivolous, a religious group tried to institutionalize the standard of secret knowledge and called it gnosticism. The use of secret knowledge didn't begin or end with them; it is the only way corrupt persons present a subject. They will not describe the specifics of evidence and logic, because the evidence and logic contradict their frauds.

is a constructive way to communicate and a destructive way to communicate.

Constructive persons always explain. Destructive persons never do. The difference is in personal moral standards.

You need to recognize the difference and demand explanations instead of trusting frauds. Has anyone ever explained a single point of the carbon dioxide fraud? They never do. Supposedly the IPCC has it figured out, and all you have to do is go along with their conclusions.

If it can't be explained; it is a fraud.

END OF

If it can't be explained; it is a fraud

Sounds a bit like the EU to me, which IS a fraud IT can’t be explained or justified either!.

The financial crisis could be the euro's death knell ... and even end the shambolic EUWOULDN’T THAT BE WONDERFUL!

NEVER forget in 1997 Gordon Brown and the claque of anti British crooks and useful idiots he and Blair surrounded themselves with took over responsibility for the British economy taking over balanced books – today 11 years later Britain is in debt to the tune of approaching £2 Trillion which if counted at one Pound per second would take 63,000 years to count YES Sixty Three Thousand Years!I

t is now probable that by 2010-12 Britain is likely to have uncheduled power outs due to the incompetence of the Government to implement a programme of building Nuclear power stations as the backbone of a clean fuel industry and building coal fired power stations and trash burner systems with chimney scrubbers – the ONLY way to provide sufficient power for survival alongside the omni present and readily available Oil supply which seems on EVERY scientific model, based on discovered resources so far, to be sufficient for mankind’s needs for over a century.


Regards,
Greg L-W.
01291 – 62 65 62

MAY I SUGGEST – since there is no political party of repute advocating or campaigning for withdrawal of these United Kingdoms from the EU and restoration of our independent sovereign democracy, with Justice & the right to self determination in a free country:

Write Upon Your Ballot Paper:

LEAVE THE EU

Monday 13 October 2008

63,000 Years of Brown Debt !!! #A04* (G025)

63,000 Years of Brown Debt !!! #A04* (G025)


The financial crisis could be the euro's death knell ... and even end the shambolic EU

Hi,



Just a bit of a roundup this morning before you dash out and jump from the window, along with thousands of contrite Bankers & honest accountants, who as professional gamblers have clearly backed not just the wrong colour but isolated themselves in playing against the odds in a huge and unsecured gamble on a number, along with the Government that ‘Likes to say YES’ when handing out our money and increasing our taxes.

Consider the details of Britain’s debt which was somewhere in excess of £1.3 Trillion under the careful and prudent care of Gordon Brown Prudent as ever it had ONLY risen by £1.3Trillion during his tour of duty at a time when there were approximately 100 new stealth taxes to generate income to ensure financial prudence and a move away from ‘boom and bust’ economics he so frequently warned us of.



Then on top of the £1.3Trillion of debt he incurred for us he has had a great giveaway – in fact claimed to be setting the world an example of giving away the money stolen from the tax payers – normally tax is for the good of the society but under Gordon Brown tax has been to buy 3 elections for his old mate Tony!



Anyway to add to the £1.3Trillion we have £100bn.+ handed over to his banking mates in Northern Rock based in Newcastle on which Labour is dependent (one wonders if they were based in Surrey and called The Green Belt Bank whether they would have been bailed out with OUR money!), add to that his giveaway of £500bn. Of OUR money again to bail out his mates the bankers – I wonder what he did with the proceedes of the 600tonnes of OUR gold he sold!



So ignore the gold that is £1.3Trillion+£100bn.+500bn. Basing the figures on a low level of interest that means that you and I owe together with the rest of the population of Britain – except the Somalis, French, Germans, Sudanese, Nigerian, Pakistanis, Indians, Bangladeshis, South Africans, Sri Lankans, Spanish, Ghanaians, Zionists and their ilk will probably leg it a bit quick when they find they owe a lot of money!



Anyway that works out that Labour have Conservatively ie without a bleat from the opposition, have incurred us in £1.9Trillion so to allow for the odd bit I forgot let us call that £2Trillion!!!


A trillion is a one followed by twelve zeros---1,000,000,000,000.



In one year (taking account of leap year) there are 31,600,000 seconds.



1 trillion divided by 31, 600,000 seconds is 31,546 years.



It will take 31,546 years to count the first trillion dollars.




WELL DONE Mr. Brown:with such Prudence in 11 years since you took over managing Britain’s finances you have squandered so much money it will take over 63,000 years to count it!

OK so let's put it another way since we all know roughly how long ONE Second is and most of us know how long it takes us to earn ourselves (after tax £10,000) - Well wee Prudence has incurred debt since he took over control of our finances in 1997 at the rate of £9,111.00 per SECOND.



Now the truelly staggering thing about all this is that I am NOT an economist, I did NOT get one of the youngest Doctorates from Edinburgh NOR one of the highest marks EVERGordon Brown DID.



Perhaps we should shut Edinburgh University Economics Faculty if this is the product!



I state I was not nor am I an economist but I was writing polemics about the inevitability of a credit collapse and the probability of 200,000,000 deaths across EUrope due to EU policy, EU over regulation and utter incompetence in the EU and its basic principles.



Perhaps Economics is the absolute Science of Being Fiscally Wise AFTER the event.Economists are the specialists who clear up the mess economists make!



There is possibly only one good thing about being Japanese and that is that Bushido dictates that if you are a leader and you screw up this badly you have the honour to commit ‘Sepuko’ – we would at least be rid of Gordon Brown and his immediate supporters & followers and as promised Peter Mandelson is ‘right behind him’.



To try to put a value on Freedom is as futile as floccipaucinihilipilification and the metissage of our societies, as we rummage in the ashes of our dreams, the flotsam of our hopes and the jetsam of our lives.


Regards,

Greg L-W.

01291 – 62 65 62


MAY I SUGGEST – since there is no political party of repute advocating or campaigning for withdrawal of these United Kingdoms from the EU and restoration of our independent sovereign democracy, with Justice & the right to self determination in a free country:

Write Upon Your Ballot Paper:

LEAVE THE EU

Sunday 5 October 2008

Which Direction for the US Dollar? (G022)

Which Direction for the US Dollar? (G022)

Many analysts, politicians and investors are quite rightly asking which direction is the USA Dollar heading and is it sustainable? Since the second half of last year, the direction is unequivocally up.

In mid-July the dollar stood at a little over $1.60 against the Euro, but with the exception of one or two small set backs has risen since to the current level of $1.38

Last years weakness in the USA dollar may be attributed to a number of factors:
the widespread belief that the USA economy would move headlong into recession as a result of the sub prime mortgage crisis; the financial system would be hit particularly harder than those of other countries because of this crisis; and the Federal Reserve’s rather aggressive monetary policy response may result in systemic deterioration of the currency.

Despite these fears, the underlying USA economy has proven relatively robust compared to its overseas counterparts. In the second quarter, the economies of both Japan and the Euro zone contracted, with the UK remaining stagnant. US growth in the same period saw a rise of 3.3%.

Banks throughout both Europe and the Globe have seen a number of banking failures; nationalisations and mergers occur. The latest movements in the UK being the nationalisation of Northern Rock, the acquiring of Bradford and Bingley assets by Santander and the nearly completed acquisition of HBOS by Lloyds TSB.

The dollar has also been supported by the Federal Reserve Bank acting in such a way to prevent systemic risk - it allowed both Lehman Brothers to go ‘bust’ and Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to be saved at the same time . Thereby providing confidence that both free market principles plus Central Bank intervention was, and is, possible.Naturally, there is the fear that the dollar’s relative strength may affect the US export competitiveness and weaker demand from Europe and Japan will take its toll.

However, there is some relief from emerging market economies which currently account for over half of US exports.

Michael Woolfolk, senior currency strategist at the Bank of New York Mellon is quoted as saying that the dollar is benefitting not only from weakening growth expectations at home, but also “While the United States has won the battle of the growth expectations for now, opinions in the market are deeply divided over the way in which Central Banks will respond to the continued rise in inflationary pressures”.
“If the US ends up winning the battle of the interest rate differentials, with the Federal Reserve lifting rates sooner than expected, the greenback has far more upside potential than many expect”.

Whilst third quarter growth in the US is likely to drop significantly, it must be borne in mind that a weaker economy is already choking back import demand and this trade deficit impact may prove supportive of the dollar. However, in order to sustain dollar strength the US needs to consume less and emerging markets such as China need to consume more – both of which are occurring.

In addition, the result of earlier dollar weakness has seen the growth in foreign direct investment (FDI) in the US. So a relatively cheaper dollar, gains in productivity and lower labour costs have enabled FDI in the US to rise by nearly two thirds last year to $277 billion. However, whilst FDI inflows would support the dollar, the latest budget forecasts from the US Council of Economic Advisers (CEA) which projects a record high deficit of $482 billion in fiscal 2009 may have an opposing effect.

Higher US interest rates may be required to maintain foreign inflows but if both budget and current account deficits surge and US interest rates remain at current level (or fall further) this would have a profound negative impact for the dollar.

Bearing in mind the current fear of a recession occurring it would be difficult to see the Federal Reserve even contemplating a rise in interest rates for some time yet.

The question as to whether the dollar’s rise is sustainable is difficult to predict at this stage. Too many negative variables may prove destabilising, but the Fed’s action preventing systemic risk as the result of the sub prime market; increasing foreign investment into the US and a relatively robust economy compared with Europe and Japan may enable a slow but gradual strengthening of the dollar to continue.

From an Associate's Blog

To try to put a value on Freedom is as futile as floccipaucinihilipilification and the metissage of our societies, as we rummage in the ashes of our dreams, the flotsam of our hopes and the jetsam of our lives.

Regards,
Greg L-W.
01291 – 62 65 62

I SUGGEST – since there is clearly no political party of repute, advocating or campaigning for withdrawal of these United Kingdoms from the EU and restoration of our independent sovereign, democracy, with Justice & the right to self determination in a free country:

Write Upon Your Ballot Paper:

LEAVE THE EU

Saturday 4 October 2008

Will Interest Rates be cut next week? (G021b)

Will Interest Rates be cut next week? (G021b)

The answer: quite possibly and almost definitely by January 2009.

We can forget at this stage Fiscal and Monetary policy textbook definitions/solutions for the UK economy ; political and economic reality on the ground suggests that the UK has been in recession for many months and its getting worse. One only has to look at the Building Industry (collapse), the Pub/Brewery Business (closing scores of pubs every week), the Finance Sector laying off thousands of jobs in the City and the Provinces, the Retail Sector (Marks and Spencer and John Lewis announcing major decline in sales), Car Sales (prestige and medium value cars down in excess of 50%), Hotel and Leisure (on its back) etc etc.

The Bank of England Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) which meets on Thursday 9th October is faced with a very simple but stark choice. Reduce interest rates and attempt to prevent a worsening of the recession already gripping Britain or keep them on hold to at least give the impression of holding out against inflation (a rise is simply just inconceivable) or until it is certain that inflation has peaked (the Consumer Price Index showed a rise to 4.7% in August against the Bank of England target of just 2%).

The Purchasing Manager’s index for the UK services sector fell in September to 46 from 49.2 in August – heralding a sharp decline in new business as a result of dwindling confidence as the global financial crisis gathers pace. With unemployment rising and the hotels and restaurant sectors being particularly hit, there is little to suggest that a recovery is all but a far way off.
With inflation however being somewhat curtailed as the result of lower oil prices, and in view of the comments made in the first paragraph of this article, it seems very likely, that the MPC can justify an interest rate cut of 0.25% - 0.5% in the short term.

However, working against this, are the effects of higher utility, food and supplier prices, and the pound under pressure against the dollar (dropping 3.8% last week to $1.7750).

One of the strongest factors holding back interest rate cuts at this time is the attitude of Mervyn King (Governor of the Bank of England) himself and supported by the majority of his Committee. In his letter to the Chancellor last month, he wrote:
"the Committee has become firmer in its belief that a period of muted economic growth is necessary to dampen pressures on prices and wages and return inflation to the target".

Pitted against this is: the announcement that UK House prices recorded their largest one year fall since 1991; the rise in LIBOR rates (the rate at which banks lend to each other – if they do at all); and the Halifax raising interest rates to mortgage customers - it will be difficult for all but an ‘Iron Governor’ not to reduce rates on Thursday, if only to help hold off further declines in confidence.

From an Associates Blog.

Regards,
Greg L-W.
01291 – 62 65 62

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