In the light of events in and around Catalonia I reached for George Orwell’s Homage to Catalonia. It is a truly astonishing book (£6 on Amazon) in that Orwell was only 34 years or so old when he wrote it and here recounts his involvement on the Republican or socialist side in the appalling Spanish…
I must be missing something but there has been a huge miss or fail on deliveries/completions of Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA) cars. In normal circumstances this should have pole-axed the share price but in fact there has been only a marginal decline. Very odd. But there is the sweetener in that the short sell opportunity remains and…
My generation laments the passing of Sabrina, born Norma Sykes, named after the daughter of the King of Britain and drowned in the river Severn. She was, she claimed, the Manchester junior breaststroke champion but I think she was kidding: she was surely the world senior breaststroke champion. If in doubt, just look at her…
Rather to my surprise (I needed surprising) gold has perked up this morning. I bought more. If the Catalonians today elect to backpedal on independence the final collapse of the Euro (and thus the perfect backdrop for a vertiginous rise of gold) is deferred. Thus some would say that it is premature to buy gold.…
Pensions administration review: as most readers know the old age pension paid out by the state has a fundamental problem which is that there is a decreasing fund out of which to pay it. Accordingly, HM Government takes the view that since there is no point in leaving citizens to save for their old age…
The problem with trying to kill an idea, whether religious or political, is that the task is impossible. Hitler tried and failed and so also did Stalin. So what possesses the Madrid government to think it can thump the Catalans into submission goodness only knows. Needless to add, the EU commission sees its authority being…
Dyson to electrify the West Country: I think Sir James Dyson’s intervention in the electric car market is very telling. He is clearly very intelligent and the public believe in him. He could float Dyson vehicles right now. Of how many people could the same be said? Not many. He will have had the advantage…
Moody’s have reduced the UK government’s credit rating from AA1 to AA2. Their argument is that Brexit will make it harder for the UK to repay. This is surely nonsense since all the Chancellor of the day has to do is take out his pen and sign a few cheques. Any fool can do that…
It has taken a very long time but it does seem that Quantitative Easing now comes to a stop. It will not be overnight but this surely means that interest rates are on the rise. It is very hard to see equities going ahead in this climate. ***** One feature of life has not however…
Corporate collapses: when Arthur Andersen went down 15 years ago over Enron the problem was that the liabilities of one branch of that firm spread right across the world. This is different to the collapse of Bell-Pottinger where no liabilities (at least as matters stand) are due. Here the firm which specialised in managing reputations…
