Quicken

Yes, but what passion and zeal! What commitment to have a library of quotes ready to go for Wall of Text time. A quality of rant far exceeding the strangeness of Erranta. Imagine what Venger would have made of this thread.

No need for conspiracy. The total excess deaths over five year averages tell the story of the outbreak. E.g. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-53233066

I remember the last time people were yelling New Paradigm to explain why fundamentals didn't matter any more. It was just before the Dot Com bubble burst.

It is also OK to savour some schadenfreude over the well-deserved BTL comeuppance. Sweet, sweet schadenfreude. I miss Venger

The enemy of my enemy is my friend

Bolded part is false for me. Very, very false. BTL is evil. The perpetrators might not realise, but it is. That is the cult thinking. What each BTL purchase (not build) does in net terms is to turn one owner occupier household into one renting household. All sustained by an ever-growing debt mountain. It won't end well.

Yup. It was through discussions here with Scepticus that I decided to get into Crypto in 2014, and was subsequently able to diversify into shares, P2P etc. Rather better returns than property, and NO DEBT

By the way, I think the stamp duty holiday is a deplorable move that will waste money and not work anyway. Since we're in Scotland, I doubt it will be extended here anyway (thankfully). Q

Thanks Deckard. Yes, it was the right move for us to reduce our monthly outgoings as I just retired from employment and now just run my investment business which has sailed through the rough seas of Lockdown admirably thus far.

Love this thread. Bravo Deckard. I drifted away from here, but have been popping back in a bit more lately to see the show. Naturally, prices are now set to crash as I bought (small place, cash) in December 2019, and moved in just before lockdown. Not to worry though. I wouldn't put all my eggs in one basket. I used to say the tipping point for a crash will be when the house price indices hit 150k again. Bring it on I say. I wouldn't want to be highly leveraged in this market. Q

Oh I agree, but Pension write-downs are, shall we say, politically sensitive.

Not so much a prediction, but Wirecard has chequed out: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-53176003 Turns out they cunningly 'misplaced' 1.9 billion euro down the back of the sofa, and after the FT ran stories on how dodgy they were even the auditors EY noticed: Cracking statement from the company on this by the way. 'Prevailing likelihood': https://www.theguardian.com/business/2020/jun/25/wirecard-files-for-insolvency-amid-german-accounting-scandal https://www.investegate.co.uk/wirecard-ag/eqs/statement-of-the-management-board-about-the-current-situation-of-the-co

Not quite that simple. Pensions. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-53156586

Rock and a hard place for Rishi. Companies are already looking at mass redundancies with the slightest whiff of tapering the furlough free money. Increasing taxes on limited companies will just accelerate redundancy plans.

Once-in-a-generation opportunity for a structural reform like this. Never let a good crisis go to waste etc. Here's hoping. Or how about an Abgeltungsteuer? A flat tax on private income from capital, including dividends, interests and capital gains (among others). Flat tax rate is 25% in Germany (plus the 'temporary' 5.5 % solidarity surcharge they added to many taxes in 1991). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abgeltungsteuer