gravity always wins

You may be right? The OP said in the last eight months which would be from about june last year so I am thinking peak building season should be busy and would have tailed off heading towrds winter and will now unsurpisingly pick up. Not sure what sort of lag between order and delivery in the housebuilding sector.

Housebuilders opening up sites ready to build in the spring and summer! I am seasonaly unsurprised. Housebuilders like many other myopic bubble industries in this country will carry on doing what they do until they can't.

Looks like the retarded paper bugs have been alowed out for the afternoon again!

I think he merely understands economics and history more than most.

Meanwhile in the real world most of their customers were buying their products off the back of credit. And those lovely german banks were recycling the profits back to the Irish etc. and we all know the consequences. Never mind the ridiculous labour laws they have which will soon come back to hurt them. Can't sack a German worker of a German company in Germany but can close a German owned plant in Spain ofr Italy. The german miracle of the last year is a consequence of fiscal stimulus from Beijing to Washington. Sure they make good cars and stuff but when we are all worrying about putting food on the table in a few years time we might realise that all cars tend to get you from A - B regardless of the badge or nationality. But then I do tend to find the drivers of German cars on the whole to be a bunch of di*kheads so I may be slightly biased.

Not quite as I recall it. Firstly there were the massive discoveries of natural gas and the consequent dash for gas fired instead of coal fired power stations. Then there were the cheaper imports of coal from South America and Australia (mainly open cast compared to our expensive deep coal) which consumers were more than happy to use if their bills were decreased. Then there was the question of beligerant unions bringing down democratically elected govts. which I'm sure all those who believe in democracy would agree is intolerable!!

Did scrappage bring down inventory levels? Is this more about inventories than excessive demand - I suspect it is.

No this is wrong. Monetary inflation is an increase in the supply of money. It can continue irespective of wages.

Yeah its a right pi**er. Crude WTI 2008 $147 now $100 Gold 2008 $1,000 now $1,400

When it hits Saudi Arabia then its time for the tinfoil hats!

Great thread. Looks we are moving past the denial phase then on the boom bust chart. I concur with all the anecdotals had many of the same experiences been shouted at abused ostracised etc. etc. ad nauseum. Currently taking my front row seat with a very large bucket of popcorn - I've spent a bit extra to watch the HD 3D version. Remember people might wish unsustainable bubbles to go on forever and they may think that if they are all in denial then reality won't bight - but we all know gravity always wins!! Bump!! is that the housing market.

Northern Ireland is a pimple compared to the rest of the UK. The world will not, end anyone who says so is silly which is why I suspect nobody said anything of the sort. The world will and is in the process of changing right here right now. These things take time - patience is needed.

Spot on. These parasites will get swept away its just iritating to see how long and hard they have been sucking at the teet. But again - spot on!

Aint being a lefty do gooder a profitable occupation. No wonder they don't want cuts. Paxman a sh*te interviewr he is so biased i find him utterly repulsive. I watched him interview some kid from Luton who has started a political party. The guy was trying to tell him the parties aims and Paxman kept insinuating he was racist inspite of the fact that the party had a number of black members. He sneered down his nose at this guy but when he was asked if he had ever lived in Luton or experienced the sorts of situations Paxman just cut him off. Paxman £800,000 p.a. has is a*se kicked by some kid off the streets. It was nauseating - I can't tell you if I agree of disagree with the guys politics because Paxman decided to not ask him about his politics. Apauling interview from an apauling interviewer that left me none the wiser.

Totally agree. Marr (£600,000 p.a.!!!) and Paxman (£800,000 p.a.!!!) are champagne socialists they want us to pay for their tax avoiding, their villas in the South of France and their numerous ped a terres its socialist guilt. Polly Toynbee - nuff said. Balls offers Jam today and jam tomorow it only works when the population doesn't understand where the jam comes from.

It is very profitable none the less to take the contrary approach to you! I find the price of UK houses measured in Corn, wheat, silver and gold very relevant I think you should too. Just sayin.

If you think a densly populated island is immune to real estate crashes I suggest you read a little about the Japanese real estate market still down twenty years later. Supply and demand of credit is far more important to prices at this stage in the cycle.

The Fed is involved in alot of paper shuffling this week (POMO), being as we hold a lot of their sh*te and they ours may have some bearing on it. Maybe some rebalancing?

Disgraceful action by the Dutch central bank and we all know what they hold in their vaults.

Yes, totally unexpected of course!

We never came out of recession Merv you dipsh*t. GDP is overstated thanks to your funny money and Zirp, and your inflation figures are a joke. The economy is shrinking in real terms.

Remember if you invest in something that generates a yield you have to make sure that the counterparty can fulfil their obligation in real terms. Its not the return on your money you need to be worried about but the return of your money. Got gold? But don't forgrt you can always eat paper even when it is worthless but I wouldn't advise eating too much gold. Just thought I would get that argument out of the way!

Good question in which I have to declare a hatred of all Govt inflation fugures especially when they include falling domestic asset prices to negate any rise in import and global prices and then exclude food and energy. But essentially now we are printing so is everyone else so the same amount of commodities are being bid up in all currencies. Plus we are all now in a global commodities boom due to prining now so its going to start to affect everyone. the video gives a good indication that prices are rising and they are probably being masked like ours are by less quality, less quantity and a change of eating habits we are all boiled frogs when it comes to the truth of inflation.

Under a gold atandard as he ws refering to the note is redeemable for the gold. otherwise it wouldn't be a gold standard. Monetising gold would involve paying for it with a certificate and then some time later not redeemong the certificate for the stated quantity of gold thats getting owt for nowt. A gold standard is a gold standard until people starting issuing extra certificates then it isn't a gold standard.

Yes in a very basic nutshell, Japan printed lots of Yen then sold them for Dollars driving down its currency (helping exports and domestic economy) and flooded the western world with cheap money. Two points of difference Japans troubles occured during a global boom not a global depression so there was a demand for their funny money abroad. Secondly they didn't have much competition then but now everyone is at it. The money never stayed at home so didn't influence its domestic economy but as the carry trade has unwound its sitting somewhere waitng to flood its domestic economy. Basically Japan never really had a deflation it money supply grew. But thats a whole different ball game.