Bubble&Squeak

Very much so... http://www.swarmusa.com/vb4/content.php/282-THE-Most-Important-Chart-of-the-CENTURY

... and sadly most just pissed it up the wall

With all due respect this fallacy is one of the conerstones of the tower of shite we find ourselves under. We have been programmed oh so well to believe that greed is human nature... it is in our genes! The oligarchs are where they are because they are superior, genetically. Q.E.D. ... No! Push the correct buttons over and over and you will get the "right" response... the masses are very far from waking up...

Exactly. We live in a Plutocracy where the richest have political control. It just so happens that (as some idiots decided to give them control over the world's reserve currency) the banks are probably the richest and have greatest influence... of course there are many other corporations that wield power over us... ever wonder why we are so quick to spend billions on firing missiles at oil rich nations?

Indeed, the population of greater Tokyo area is well north of 35 million people. The concequences of the worst case scenario are trully staggering for the whole of Asia. Don't forget we still have radioactive grass in Wales.... and that was 1986 and the fallout travelled c.1400 miles

I read his comment as: "OK we get it. We're not welcome here, You lot know what you are talking about so this is our last contribution on this site as our time is best served preaching to the financially illiterate"..... This is the sad fact. Most people have no idea they are being royally shafted. These guys are sent forth to bore the general public to death with meaningless and often inaccurate facts while their chums wilfully debase our currency and steal wealth from every last one of us. It is about time our elected representatives grew a pair (and mustered some dignity and probity) and stood up to these shysters.

If the credit card ABS market blows it could be very, very messy for everyone; credit market freeze(s), monoline failure and so on.... be careful what you wish for. It is very worrying that unsecured debt levels have been allowed to continue to grow. This really could be the next big one to drop...

If ROI Government insured their bonds, yes. However sadly for them this will not have been the case as Monoline (Bond) Insurance Oh dear...

Were there not a number of secret loans that were made by the Bank and ECB early on in the crisis? I remember an excellent post here (annoyed I can't find it as it was a particualrly good thread) where it was shown that large amounts of EUR->GBP forex exchanges were being made on the days that the ECB were providing discount loans (bailouts) to insolvent institutions. No specific reports in the public press as to which banks were taking the loans but the GBP value spike was such as to make one believe that the sums were large. It was shown that this was likely to have been one of the main reasons GBP was so strong vs EUR shortly before it collapsed... it was effectively a weekly shot in the arm for GBP as the banks purchased GBP. I am sure Barclays, and others, would have been drinking from this teat before it was withdrawn. With all that goes on it is easy to forget the details... they rely on this, they can then rewrite popular history. Bailout? What bailout...

I am not sure about this? You can carry any amount across the border from Europe... would seem odd Direct Gov Link EDIT: clarity

I like this Henry Pryor guy... Edit: Removed quote

The question is how does HPC.co.uk or PricedOut.org get this kind of information out there? We can talk about it 'till we are blue in the face but unless the general populous start seeing the bigger picture nothing will change...

erm... it does... anyway... doesn't change the fact it is about as far off topic as any thread I have ever read here there should be an award for the most off topic thread to get past the mods

Bit of a sweeping surface skim of a critique there gruffydd... I know you are a UK basher extraordinaire but chill out old chap... it is Ok for other states to be in the cr@p too and I am sure there is plenty more UK labelled bad news in the pipeline ... I take the article for what it is meant to be, a blog... ie someone's opinion and add it in with all of the other titbits to get the big picture. Anyway the size of the public sector and the employment market in general in France is a bit of a joke with my French friends (ever wondered why so many young French are living in London??) although I doubt they would know the actual figures... For instance in the blog post he does demonstrate the difficulty in getting reliable statistics thus: Would be interesting to see any links to your source of 25%... TBH I would be surprised if it isn't > twice that but do not have the figures .... but then I doubt anyone does....

I think it is more that we are pretty much all concentrated into the bottom right hand corner of the island. The country is mainly uninhabited, someone posted the figures here once and it was amazing how much unused space there is, especially from the perspective of where I live and work. IMPO it is the inequality in the distribution of a country's wealth that places it on the scale of "shyte place to live" for the average Joe. I think it is no coincidence that as the inequality in the UK has grown over the last three decades it has become an increasingly unpleasant and stressful place to live .Unaffordable houses are just one aspect of that...

Wow, you really have had a bad time haven't you. Half my family are Bulgarian, they live a long way from either Sofia or the sea side both of which are areas I stay well away from. I have always had a great time there, the people I have met professionally and personally are always friendly and interested in who you are, where you are from etc... true they have a certain penchant for track suits and leather jackets but hey, they are Eastern Europeans what can they do. Can't believe what you say about the food... basically they eat a Greek, Turkish and Med food mix which is fantastic IMHO especially good in BG are pork, tomatoes, peaches, watermelons and any sour milk products and of course the original "feta" cheese ... Maybe you ate out in a lot in crap places? Our local eatery serves a meshena skara (mixed grill) big enough for four for 15leva (c. 2.3/£ at the mo) and you can go and see most of the animals you'll be eating in the future just up the road, no steriods or antibiotics required in their rearing. The property boom in Bulgaria was clearly the most rediculous aspect of the global credit boom. As would be expected, considering the lack of any form of government control, it attracted the worst possible characters in search of a quick buck from all over the baltics, the quantity of crap or unfinished property in the (cough) "resorts" is mind boggling. I can see many being pulled down in the next few years. Yes it is a very poor country with a woefully corrupt government but it is certainly not the place or the people you describe in my experience.

Rubbish. Absolute rubbish This now means that every other property of it's type in the vicinity/development is now priced at £nk higher than it needed to have been. This is the concept of pricing at the margins and is why the housing market is so easy to manipulate over time. This behaviour is a very important part of why this country's economy is going/has gone down the toilet. If this is for real, which I am still not even 50% sure about, they deserve the broadside IMHO. HPC[.co.uk] is NOT about "winning hearts and minds" and never will be. Besides, if after all that has happened in the last decade you still want to jump into the current market at a premium then you really are a lost cause. IMO HPC.co.uk is a place to come to share information with people that feel disillusioned primarily with the price of a life essential, housing, and also have an interest in the wider economy and how it operates. Of all the possible threads subjects I can think of this surely deserves our derision above nearly all others. Hence my initial response and my more than niggling feeling that this is a wind-up Yes, fnar fnar n' all that ... it's got to be a wind-up hasn't it...

Really, why is that? Genuinely interested...

especially their bowels...

Trying to pay more than you are told something is worth would go a long way to showing signs of obsession in most people's book surely.... and it would be a whole lot easier for you and others if such a large percentage of the population hadn't lost their minds like you clearly have... Straw man...

Bull or Bear? Bear.... Why should you care... surely you are too busy bidding up a life essential so the rest of us that are not obsessed by property are forced to spend more of our hard-earned lining banksters pockets Sling yer hook you fool :angry:

yep... sick isn't it Anyway welcome to the club; very liberating y'know I couldn't give two sihts about house prices anymore and I have never been happier and of course I am completely debt free

Added to: extra day for cheques to clear £10 to replace your card if it is damaged/lost etc Have to have cleared funds the night before the day a transfer/payment is due to be made (WTF) I think I will also consider closing my NW account...

is that an old armchair next to the bath.... WTF?