Member Info for skier1

67Sam

It's been said on here many times. The UK has the 2nd lowest state debt in the entire global G7. The IMF says the UK is the fastest-growing G7 economy. No other G7 country is raising major post-covid taxes. Many are cutting taxes. The US is giving away a huge $600 billion (for free graduate debt), for example. The UK tax rises are needless and self-inflicting us into a recession. The debt and tax hysteria is out of control. We (UK) have below-average debt. Tax rises are not needed.

LTI

The Tories won't take away that energy support. We've entered a new pseudo-communist era, where the govt takes ever-more control of your money, lifestyle and home. There is also an election in 2024. It's a fair bet that energy cap will be renewed in mid-2023 and prices won't be allowed to go up.

Wholesale inflation today is already plunging. UK natural gas spot prices have collapsed -70% in the past 3 months, for example. It is only a matter of time before UK retail inflation starts to fall sustainably. China is now already talking about deflation for 2023.

UK taxes are (needlessly) soaring to a record high. We don't need a double whammy of BoE overshoot. Especially when they've just spent the past year (massively) undercalling those rate rises. No need to pile misery on top of misery on top of misery.

Hardup

That is still a solid 5.25% return. For (effectively) zero risk, it is a great deal.

For bigger sums, like £20k, Gatehouse is doing 5.10% for 5 years, and BLME at 5.00% for 7 years.

£400 a month is currently 5 times more than the average monthly UK household savings rate. Half the country would be ****ahoop if they could save 400 quid a month.

Yes, 0.75% looks baked in.

But looking this morning at red Rishi's reckless tax grab coming down the pipeline in early 2023, everyone paying thousands more, a 0.50% rise from the BoE this week wouldn't be a surprise. UK taxes are spiraling out of control. The last thing we need is an out-of-control base rate.

The LLOY divvy today is around 5.10%.

LLOY is currently offering a bank savings account, risk-free, paying 5.25%...

China is sliding into the (dreaded) middle-income trap and looks less and less likely to overtake the US as the world's biggest economy before 2050. Manufacturing is fleeing China for India, Vietnam, etc. The Ren is weakening and nowhere near being a global reserve currency like the dollar. China headwinds are growing.

HFEL share price has plunged -35% in the past 5 years. Even with dividends, it's barely at 0% breakeven. The S&P500 (in GBP) has rocketed +85% in that same timeframe. In no way at all can HFEL be described as a good or "not bad" investment.

Empty checkouts are not good for investors. Sainsbury's share price has collapsed -65% in the past 15 years, and it is currently lower than 1988, a third of a century ago, when Maggie Thatcher was still in power!

Bitcoin is less than 1% of the world's money system. It is one of the most overhyped financial products of all time.

Rishi's only "plan" is to raise tax to record levels and take more of your family's cash.

Was in an Aldi over the weekend. Never seen a UK supermarket so busy. Every till was 5 or 10 shoppers deep, trolleys brimming over with stuff, and staff working flat-out at 100% capacity. Suspect the next Kantar numbers will show yet another huge marketshare leap for Aldi UK this fourth quarter.

As predicted, HFEL is now testing the 240p level. A close below 240p would be another very bearish sign. Shanghai Disneyland locked down over the weekend, dragging Asia sentiment down even further.

LLOY (5%) is no longer a good divvy share. You can today get the same 5% pa, thru 2030, for 7 years -- guaranteed and completely riskfree -- from a simple UK savings account. The LLOY share price has plunged -40% in the past 7 years since 2015. What's more, the UK taxfree savings allowance can (for some) be higher than the taxfree divvy allowance, making you even more profit.

LTI

Agreed. If the BoE don't match or beat the ECB 0.75% next week, there will be a fresh run on the pound.

Folks are always saying the UK house market will crash, and it never does. Everyone always piles in to buy the dip.

Anyway, a -10% dip would only take UK house prices back to 2021 levels. Hardly a catastrophe, to be fair.

Yuri

Of course, the media is influential in every country on Earth. That is nothing new.

But when clickbait journalistic hysteria is starting to run every aspect of UK govt, from speech to tax, you have to say the media influence is out of whack and out of control.

This looks now in freefall. Plunging -20% in 4 months. A dip under 200p in 2023 can't be discounted here.

The ~4% dividend means nothing, when the LLOY share price has tanked -25% this year, the forward guidance is "concerning", and a bank / oil windfall tax from the red Tories (egged on by the Bolshevik Broadcasting Corp) looks all but baked in.

...“The market appears to control Governments these days, whoever we vote for”...
..."The city money runs the country, the government are just a distraction on the sidelines"...

The UK is largely run by the *media*, such as the BBC, FT, Guardian and Daily Mail.

Take the recent UK bond crisis, for example. Markets moved barely an inch for the first half-hour when Kwarteng and Truss introduced their new budget. There was no crisis... It was only when the first shouty headlines appeared, after 30-60mins, stirring needless hysteria about tax tweaks, that the markets started to tank. Now there was a crisis.

Negative headlines drive negative markets.

The higher those UK bank profits go (due to interest rates), the likelier those fat cat bankers will be slammed with a bank windfall tax...