Monthly Archives: September 2008

Mr Milliband’s incautious remarks in a lift are important political news, proving that the government fiddles whilst Rome, Wall Street and London burn. There is one thing worse than Mr Brown in Number 10, and that would be Mr Miliband. He is completely sold out to the European project, and would hustle us into even [...]

All those who heralded last week’s move to stop short selling of financial shares on both sides of the Atlantic wanted to believe that short sellers were responsible for the market fall, and thought a regulatory change could stop it. Yesterday showed how wrong that was. Wall Street plunged another 3%. Markets can and do [...]

Jealousy and anger are powerful emotions. When mixed they make a Labour conference. The Democrats have a point when they say they will not vote for a massive bailout if some of the money rewards shareholders of the banks in trouble, and if some pays large bonuses to the executives who got it wrong. Many [...]

Gordon Brown tells us he is the man able to pilot us through the financial crisis and the economic downturn. So what should he do? 1. Interest rates. The US slashed rates which ran at 5.25% through most of 2007, to only 2% today. In the UK Brown’s MPC (all his direct and indirect appointees) [...]

A few years ago when the Conservatives were stuck in the low 30s in the polls it became fashionable for the party hierarchy to try to copy everything Blair had said and done in the late 1990s when he was so popular. It did not work as a strategy, for people thought to themselves if [...]

It is currently fashionable to argue that because there is a mess in the banking world there needs to be more regulation. We need first of all to ask how this most regulated of industries got into the current difficulty? Why did all the regulaiton we already have fail to stop the crisis? Indeed, did [...]

This morning we learn from government sources that the PM has taken the action necssary to see us through the crisis. Did I miss something? I heard the US authorities announce large extra liquduity for markets, and heard them announce a buy up plan for unloved mortgages. The US Congress, which is allowed to meet, [...]

That was quite a week in financial markets. The US Administration has been trying everything to get the money markets and the market in credits to work again. They decided that they could draw a distinction between financial institutions that were too crucial to allow to go into Administration – Fannie. Freddie and AIG – [...]

The PM’s belated intervention into the financial crisis is curious. He tells us he intends to clean up markets. Who exactly was regulating and presiding over dirty markets over the last 11 years? In what way do they need cleaning? Why wasn’t it done before? From past interventions we know the PM thinks there needs [...]