Wall St falls on weak profit expectations – New York Report October 13, 2015 RENEWED fears of a slowdown in Chinese growth and another bout of selling in biotech shares yesterday forced US stocks lower. Ending a seven sessions of rises, the Dow Jones industrial average fell 49.97 points, or 0.29 per cent, to 17,081.89, the S&P 500 lost 13.77 points, or 0.68 per cent, to 2,003.69 and the [...]
EU referendum: Twelve more reasons Brexit campaigners have momentum October 13, 2015 A couple of months back, I listed 12 reasons why the positive momentum was with Brexit campaigners, and in closing said I would return to give another 12. Well here we are again and I can tell you that I’m even more upbeat. Here’s why the sun is still shining even though the summer is [...]
Olivier Blanchard’s stopped clock: Integration won’t save the struggling Eurozone October 13, 2015 Olivier Blanchard, the recently retired head of economics at the International Monetary Fund, has something of a track record with his predictions. In 2013, he warned George Osborne that he was “playing with fire” with the UK’s recovery from the financial crisis. Austerity had to be relaxed. We now know that we were actually [...]
Betting on inflation: What we learned from our wager on the character of the UK recovery October 13, 2015 In March 2013, we made a bet via Twitter on what would happen to UK inflation as the economy started to recover. Andrew bet that, within 18 months of one-year GDP growth exceeding 2 per cent, inflation would reach 5 per cent or more. He thought that that would happen because economic recovery would [...]
Is the Labour Party right to abandon its support for George Osborne’s fiscal charter? October 13, 2015 Len Shackleton, professor of economics at the University of Buckingham, and economics fellow at the Institute of Economic Affairs, says Yes Fiscal rules have a poor record: think Gordon Brown’s Golden Rule, or the EU’s Stability and Growth Pact. Of course, the fiscal charter will be different – but don’t they all say that? Passing [...]
Pension freedoms: Six months on, savers still held up by four-week wait to access lump sums October 13, 2015 Retirees hoping to make use of the new pensions freedoms are being held up for weeks by admin hurdles, research has found. Since April this year, anyone over the age of 55 has been able to take some – or even all – of their pension as a lump sum. The new rules wiped [...]
Sunderland boss Sam Allardyce: I’ve got a shot at England manager job October 13, 2015 Sunderland manager Sam Allardyce admits he still has an eye on the England job as he embarks on his mission to steer the struggling Black Cats away from Premier League relegation. Allardyce conceded yesterday, as he faced the media for the first time since his appointment last week, that reversing a run of just three [...]
Banks dump US debt pile: Cash-strapped central bankers are offloading treasuries in huge loads October 13, 2015 Emerging market governments are dumping US treasuries en masse, in the latest sign of the pressure their economies are under. China, Brazil, Russia and Taiwan have all been sellers, accounting for some of the $123bn in foreign net sales of treasury debt maturing in a year. This figure is for the 12 months to [...]
Central banks: Stop the focus on inflation – CNBC Comment October 13, 2015 Based on last week’s Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) minutes, it seems the Fed’s decision to hold off on raising interest rates at its September meeting was not a close call. The minutes showed that the FOMC was hesitant to pull the trigger, as members remain worried about global growth risks. While most of [...]
Boomerang employees: As Jack Dorsey returns to Twitter, why rehiring a former colleague is not always a win-win scenario October 13, 2015 Last week saw Jack Dorsey return to the helm at Twitter, taking up the chief executive position he initially held after founding the company in 2007. His familiarity with Twitter’s structure is an asset, but Dorsey comes with baggage, and his refusal to leave his post at payments company Square is provoking some concern. [...]
