“Truly extraordinary” deficit: Mervyn King
The charge against Gordon Brown is that his promise of future investment – instead of cuts – is cloud cuckoo land given the grim public finances. You may think this unfair. But here is the verdict of...
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Gordon Brown gets his sums wrong again
You would have thought that the prime minister would now have his public sector spending numbers at his fingertips – given that David Cameron has made the issue his focal point for three sessions of...
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Mortgage lending: a dilemma for ministers
It is a difficult circle to square:Continue reading »
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MP’s verdict on the banking white paper: “Rearranging the three key...
Attempts to clean up the financial system have become more urgent given reports of the banking world returning to normal.Continue reading »
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Bank of England “not actually about doing things” says Myners
Lord Myners gives short thrift today to Tory plans to kneecap the Financial Services Authority and transfer many of its powers to the Bank of England.Continue reading »
View ArticleWas It King What Won It?
A brief passage in George Osborne’s last Andrew Marr interview stands out: In it, the shadow chancellor heaps praise at the feet of the world’s central banks for preventing financial meltdown. “But we...
View ArticleFred Goodwin warns of UK fiscal crisis
Okay, it’s not the same Fred Goodwin. This one works as an analyst at Nomura, apparently. But the Tories have seized upon Goodwin’s report which suggests “the prospect of a UK fiscal crisis is a clear...
View ArticleSorry – forgot to tell you about the £61bn loan to RBS & HBOS
An astonishing tale emerged this morning as Bank of England executives faced the Treasury select committee. It transpired that the BoE extended secret emergency financing to RBS and what was then HBOS...
View ArticleTories would cut faster and further…but not deeper. Confused?
It was all just a dream. You may have thought that the Tories were the party of fiscal probity. You may have thought that they were the ones who were going to get a grip on Britain’s desperate public...
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Live coverage: Agius gives evidence
Welcome to our live coverage of Marcus Agius’ testimony to MPs. The outgoing Barclays chairman faces questions on rate-rigging by the bank’s traders and his defence of Bob Diamond. By Tom Burgis and...
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Start the presses?
A politically explosive economic policy was smuggled into the bank bailout today. With little fanfare, the Bank of England was given a green light to start printing money, should it deign it necessary...
View ArticleWhere now for the debt rating of UK plc?
It’s the question being asked today – and the best explanation I’ve seen is in this morning’s Lex column: Britain came off the gold standard in 1931 and sterling devalued by 28 per cent. The economic...
View ArticleThe £30bn gloom gap
The lack of attention given to the Bank of England’s grim forecast for the economy is bizarre. Mervyn King basically said the recession, from peak to trough, will be two times worse than the Treasury...
View ArticleAsleep at the wheel: King and the Bank
Chris Giles chronicles Mervyn King’s faltering response to the credit crunch and the fading power of the Bank: Success certainly bred a certain arrogance when it came to views about how the economy...
View ArticleThe RBS director (not Fred) with the $24m pension pot
I’m sure there’s a mixed metaphor to be had here re a big fish across the pond. But the RBS director with an equally impressive pension – according to RBS’s 2007 accounts – is one Larry (Lawrence)...
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Gordon advised to give up on new fiscal stimuli
Jean-Claude Trichet, president of the European Central Bank, warned on Monday that governments should stop concocting new stimulus measures and just get on with the ones they’ve already announced.Read...
View ArticleUK stutters in the gilt market
We predicted in October that the government could suffer an uncovered gilt auction within months because it was trying to raise such a vast amount of money from the bond markets. From Bloomberg a few...
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The seven councils which ignored the Iceland warning signs
Stern words today from the Audit Commission about the 127 councils who stuck £954m in Icelandic banks which subsequently collapsed. Singled out for the wooden spoon are the seven which put £32.8m in...
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Hedgies: printing money is Darling’s only option
Some grim developments on the public finances front. Alistair Darling prepares to acknowledge the biggest forecasting error ever made by a British chancellor (he takes the crown from Denis Healey). The...
View ArticleBoE keeps rates on hold in February – as it happened
The Bank of England has left interest rates on hold and kept its bond-buying programme unchanged. It has increased growth forecast for the next three years and said it will continue to tolerate higher...
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