Sunday, Jun 15, 2008
CEO of ailing Barratt says "It's all a conspiracy!"
Guardian: Falling like a ton of bricks
Oh dear. When it comes to desperation, saying its all a conspiracy by people out to get you usually means the game is up and its time to go quietly.
Posted by paul @ 01:41 PM (1452 views) Add Comment
25 Comments
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1. japanese uncle said...
Let's not tolerate outrageous conspracy theories.
2. Permabulls Nightmare said...
Quote. After what has probably been the worst week in his business career, Mark Clare, chief executive of beleaguered housebuilder Barratt, said: 'I look in the mirror and say, "What else should we be doing that we're not?"'
Drop the price of your houses you ducking fimwit. You know you need to.
3. Stevie Dee said...
lol.. i was just thinking about "our conspiracists", they've either got to him, or he's been reading HPC.. poor sod.... white jacket and doctor required urgently..
4. Davip said...
"...It's not great seeing price becoming disconnected with the business", Clare says.
Oh dear -- but it's all right for house prices to become disconnected from true value and reach of FTBs?
When the times were good we didn't hear a peep from these people, beyond constantly reminding us what a favour they were doing us with their £0.25M flatpack houses.
No sympathy -- it's group sense that's killing the housing market, not conspiracy. See you at the bottom...
5. Dbc Reed said...
Notice that Barratts have 130,500 unbuilt-on sites and are still buying more land. In fact the credit crunch may do them good because they can go into a near death state and sink to the bottom of the pond as long as someone buys up ever-cheaper sites for them. If there is any conspiracy, it is the age-old one in which a cartel of developers artificially restricts the supply of houses to keep their prices up.The Office of Fair Trading is supposed to be looking at this,but you would n't be able to tell from any sign of activity.
6. icarus said...
If RBS buys one too many banks and Barratt buys one too many builders everything goes pear-shaped for them. When that happens the markets short their shares. These plonkers get their profits and gongs in a benign cycle and think that the ensuing vicious cycle is force majeur - an act of god. How pathetic - "Prescott told us to build these lemons". If Prescott told you to put your hand in the fire.....
Barratt has "underlying" value. There is "underlying" demand for housing. Notice how the words "underlying" and "pent-up demand" come to the fore in a downturn. In the upturn things are what they are, but in a downturn things are, er, what they potentially are.
7. Maihem said...
> When it comes to desperation, saying its all a conspiracy by people out to get you usually means the game is up and its time to go quietly.
A few people on this news blog could do with reading that.
8. japanese uncle said...
In a bull market, executives without enough brain to calculate risks are often praised as 'aggressive business genius'. Thus there tend be a paradoxical situation in which the more stupid you are, the more successful you can be;. This applies any country.
9. icarus said...
JU - I know what you mean. I once saw stock-car racing on a figure-of-8 track. The winner was the psychopath.
10. gardeniadotnet said...
Infamy! Infamy! they've all got it....in for me.
11. plato said...
This is what happens when you conspire to ramp land prices. Apologies, did I say conspire? I meant coincidentally act with every other similar and associated business and inadvertantly increase the cost to the customer beyond normally reasonable levels,etc,etc.
12. hpwatcher said...
silly sod.
13. Ash4781 said...
In the another article I read suggested that his chief executive career was over.
14. Dave Spart said...
We'd all have a lot more respect for the developers if they simply admitted they've been the architects of their own downfall.
(pun intended!)
15. Davidg said...
> If RBS buys one too many banks and Barratt buys one too many builders everything goes pear-shaped for them. When that happens the markets short their shares.
Yes that's a good point and I don't think Mr Clare understands the stock market. The share price is an evaluation of the future earnings potential of the company - in Barrett's case the market is saying that they are fucked having not seen the housing market downturn having bought assets at a premium.
16. Cheekiecharlie said...
Please,please somebody explain to me how a company which made year after year of bumper profits on selling overpriced hen houses has fallen apart in less than a year! Surely there is still money to be made building cheap crap houses and selling them at a realistic price/profit.
17. Adrian said...
Nice way to celebrate their 50th anniversary. Lets crack open a bottle of bubbly :)
18. eurorocks said...
I think housing builders are being far too optimistic. They are making a BIG assumptions that the population numbers will continue to grow. I have my doubts.
The flow of people across the EU works both ways. We have had mostly one way traffic into the UK, because the UK looked attractive, compared to other EU countries. When/If other EU counties look more attractive, the UK will see a drop (or reversal) of population movement into the UK.
The UK economy is in a real mess. There are EU countries doing considerably better than we are. If I lived outside the UK and was a migrant worker (or looking to immigrate) I would be having a serious re-think about going to the UK.
Take Poland for an example, Poland is doing very well at the moment. So its much easier to get a good job in Poland. So less people are leaving Poland. Again less people coming to the UK.
And what happens if unemployment starts to kick in? If you have recently moved to the UK and don't have big ties in the UK (mortgage, family) then it's not too much hassle to move to another EU country, where employment is better. More people leaving the UK.
And there has been a big outflow of Brits leaving the UK, this has been masked by the bigger number of people coming into the UK.
Its going to be a VERY difficult sell to re-open the gateway from India etc, which was closed because of the high number of EU citizens moving to the UK.
This housing crash has the potential to be very, very bad if immigration starts a downward turn. (The only positive is that the unemployment numbers would be cushioned by a net outflow).
19. japanese uncle said...
When you've got money, you've got a lot of friends that crowded around your door, but wait a minute children. When the money is gone, and all your spending ends, they won't be round any more ♪♫. ("God Bless the Child" David Clayton Thomas, circa 1970) An enernal truth
20. it_is_going_with_a_bang said...
Theses muppets conspire to ramp up property prices for profit and then have the cheek to claim it's all abit unfair when they get hammered.
How amusing.
I guess his share options don't look to good.
He must be sooo pleased....
21. inbreda said...
8. eurorocks said...
I think housing builders are being far too optimistic. They are making a BIG assumptions that the population numbers will continue to grow.
And all those BTLers init for the long term - I wonder if they ever stopped to think what effect the retiring/downsizing/dieing baby boomers would have on demand. The population is surely soon to decrease substantially?
22. last_days_of_disco said...
Hmmm, I keep upsizing my expectations of the house I am going to get, this is great.
23. drewster said...
Wait guys, he's telling the truth. In recent years there have been several mysterious cases where a hedge fund has taken a massive short position in a company, then spread rumours around the interweb and around financial circles as fast as possible. Soon enough the rumours become self-perpetuating, and the stock plunges. The original spreader of the rumour makes a killing. This same behaviour has been seen before in other stocks, it's a form of price manipulation - and it has elements of conspiracy. So he's not completely mad, far from it. Read up on short-selling (in particular something called "naked short selling") and discover more about this insidious piece of financial market manipulation.
24. gardeniadotnet said...
@ drewster,
I don't doubt what you're saying for a second.
However, if you live by the sword......
25. ontheotherhand said...
"Prior to the credit crunch, Clare says he was preparing for a downturn, reducing costs...."
Really?
Barratt interim report 31 December 2006, "Looking ahead we are well placed to continue our growth. The housing market is sound and the underlying business is strong. We hope to capitalise on this position as we look to complete the acquisition and integration of Wilson Bowden."