Member Info for skier1

South Korea KOSPI plunging -8% and triggering circuit breakers, Japan sinking -7%, Asia's biggest stockmarket, oil rocketing over $120 for its biggest rise in 40 years... Brace for a UK and US market crash this week... Black Monday 2.0!

Gunsup,

That "speech" just sounds like sour grapes, from the declinist EU bloc.

Fact is, the West has strengthened dramatically in the past 15 months. Russia is (finally) bogged down in Ukraine, sapping resources, Russia got kicked out of Syria, along with Assad, Russia and China defence systems in Venezuela proved completely worthless, China has been kicked out of Venezuela (Maduro proxy), China has been kicked out of the vital Panama Canal (port gone), China is currently being kicked out of Iran (one of its "pearls"), and China and Russia will soon be kicked out of Cuba!

Fact is, today in 2026, in almost every major rogue state on the planet, Russia and China are in retreat, and the West (mostly the US) is advancing and ramping back up its hard and soft power.

The Finland guy just smacks of sour grapes, because they and the EU are being left behind. For example, the US did not consult the EU or Finland (or UK) before heading into Iran. Despite leftwing hysteria, the West is actually strengthening. The results are clear.

..."Psychologically I think his near death experience pre-election may have unhinged him and thinks he can abuse his power with God on his side !"...

America has been planning regime change for Iran for over a decade. Rubio made a big landmark speech to Congress about it in 2015. Today's military action has been in the pipeline and planning for 10+ years. There's nothing unhinged about bringing long-term peace to the Middle East. Almost every major nation in the region has now chosen peace and trade, from Saudi to Dubai to Oman. Iran is the last big player to choose war and terror.

LLOY is just tracking the US bank sector, which has been tanking since the start of the year due to private-credit fears.

When you see the unmatched wealth and power the US has, it makes the rest of the world jealous with uncontrollable envy (including the UK).

Trump is sweeping out the last of the rogue regimes in Central and South America, such as Venezuela and Cuba, and he's now clearing out the last major rogue regime left in the Middle East (Iran). It's a very clever strategy.

US is just sweeping up the last of the bad actors in South America and Middle East. And dramatically weakening China and Russia in the process. Trump and his team are geopolitical geniuses.

Almost all the Middle East players want Iran gone. It's NOT just Israel and the US. For example, Saudi and Iran are defo not friends. Check the regional map 👍

https://www.france24.com/en/20160105-map-sunni-shiite-influence-middle-east-saudi-arabie-iran

Dorf,

Go check the charts for the past 25 years. The FTSE 100 follows the Dow / S&P. UK stocks and banks just follow the US. When one goes up, the other goes up. When one goes down, the other goes down. The London market now is just too small to carve out its own direction. The US dog wags the UK tail 👍

Somebody was saying on YouTube that UK unemployment has risen under every single Labour govt (bar one) since the party was formed a 125 years ago!

Labour is the party of unemployment.

LLOY is being dragged down by the bear market in US banking stocks. The US bank index has plunged 5-10% since the start of the year, due to fears about the AI software crisis, the private-credit crisis, and the Iran crisis.

This "company" has been "looking" for diamonds for a quarter of a century...

Looks like Drastic Dave wants to make the company more efficient. He's having to unpick years of classic British management. Billions wasted on overpaid short-term dividends for shareholders, while underinvesting in long-term internal operations for workers. Some 60% of all Diageo orders today are still ordered manually! In the computer age. Meanwhile, China sales are plunging by half. Drastic Dave got one helluva job on his hands.

Big money piling in here, from high-confidence investors. Rerate underway 👍

P&R are rather selective about their investments, and only pick what they think are "young elephants" that can grow big. They have a good track record. They 10-bagged on Chapters Group (Germany) from 2021, for example. Taking a large 25% stake here in DSG is as good a vote of confidence from an investment firm as you're ever gonna get.

Houston, we have lift-off 🚀

Looking at the sudden flood of trading volume here, it's clear the market senses something is coming.

Revenue, profit, investor support, acquisition power, all looking set to trend up in 2026. Classic turnaround story 👌

Good report on how US banks, such as Goldman Sachs, made a record $300 billion of collective profit last year, and their outlook for this year. That's what's helping to drive up Lloyds and other UK banking shares. A rising US tide is lifting the UK ships.

https://www.tipranks.com/news/a-happy-year-record-300b-profits-put-us-bank-stocks-back-in-focus

Use the Lloyds app. Takes 2mins to deposit a cheque, from anywhere on the planet, even from space (via Starlink).

https://www.lloydsbank.com/business/help-and-support/online-banking/deposit-cheques-in-business-mobile-banking-app.html

It's a bizarre world, when 9 unelected activist "judges: can strike down a president elected by 80 million citizens. Trump must prevail on tariffs. Almost all the world uses extensive trade tariffs, and have been for decades. The US is just playing catchup.

Ukraine has had the ability to hit Russia's oil and gas production since day 1 of the war in 2022. But they were "persuaded" to hold off early in the conflict by Germany and the EU, because the EU were still buying vast amounts of Russian oil and gas (and still do). It's the EU's dirty little secret. They've bought over a trillion Euros of fossil fuels from Russia this century, and have (basically) funded the Russian war machine to invade Ukraine. It's nuts.