Category Archives: Northern Rock

I was asked to write a piece on what the government should do next in the Northern Rock refinancing saga. Those most closely involved – the company, shareholders, the Bank of England and the government – will need to take professional advice on the legal, tax and investment complexities they have dug themselves into. The [...]

The Fed duly cut interest rates by another 50 basis points, taking them down to just 3%. We see recession fighting in full cry in the USA, where the Central Bank and the administration are uniting to pull the US economy out of its sharp slowdown. Lower interest rates will ease some of the tensions [...]

The Chancellor has promised a statement next week to try to sort out the regulatory mess that characterised the Northern Rock debacle. What he needs to do is the following: 1. Ensure the Bank of England is more than just a monthly tea party for a group of academic economists sitting round talking about interest [...]

The sub prime crisis, a run on a UK mortgage bank, and now the loss of $7 billion dollars through rogue trades at Soc Gen: and still they say regulation works! I accept that financial services businesses can be different. Where they take money from people, on the promise they will repay it at some [...]

Three cheers for the Fed. One cheer for each 25 basis point cuts in interest rates announced as an emergency measure yesterday. It did the trick, limiting the savage market decline, and turning round the Asian markets which had been in freefall the previous day. The US authorities have made it clear to the markets [...]

The collapse of Stock markets around the world should come as no surprise. As readers of this blog will know, the years of easy credit were decisively ended last August when the financial community woke up to the reality of the securitised loans crisis, aided by the Central Banks at last in tighten mode after [...]

I am glad to have won the battle against Vince Cable to avoid nationalisation of Northern Rock. I am grateful to the Jeremy Vine programme and the Week In Westminster for giving airtime to the case against nationalisation. Their commonsense and fairness shows up the lamentable performance of the Today programme, the World at One [...]

The government needs to: 1. Get a grip on its lending to Northern Rock and set out how and when it will be getting money back from this bank. 2. Remove wasteful and unpopular public spending, like ID cards, regional government, extra contributions to the EU, too many spin doctors and consultancy contracts. 3. Start [...]

<p> The idea that Northern Rock loans will be packaged and sold to the private sector is not a solution to the crisis, especially as there will be a government guarantee on them. Instead, this represents a decision by the government to lengthen the period over which it is prepared to lend to Northern Rock.</p> [...]

Things are bad enough without talking ourselves into recession. Some banks and commentators have already called a recession in the USA, when the figures for the last quarter of 2007 show the US economy was still growing well. Here in the UK the retailers have added to the sense of gloom by concentrating on their [...]