interesting news

During the boom Spanish property prices were fuelled by a virulent mix of cheap credit and speculation, which inflated a bubble. The credit crunch triggered by the US subprime mortgage meltdown put an end to that, and the bubble has now burst (it was going to burst one day anyway).

But the hangover from the credit binge is a mammoth housing glut, especially of second homes on the coast, and frightening levels of mortgage debt, which means lots of negative equity as house prices fall.

Given the extraordinary nature of the financial crisis and subsequent deleveraging process, this may turn out to be anything but an ordinary housing bust. It could get a whole lot worse.

At the very least, property values now have to return to (or under-shoot) their long-term affordability level of 4 times average disposable household income, down from the recent peak of 7 times income.

Prices for holiday homes may fall even further. After all, who really needs them?

Yet many vendors are still in denial, and continue to ask silly prices, even though they don’t sell. That means that average asking prices are a poor guide to property values. There is a gulf between what many vendors are asking, and what properties are actually selling for. But, thanks to British vendors in distress and the weak pound, there is now a reasonable choice of properties coming onto the market at sensible prices. With their have-to-sell discounts, distressed British vendors are driving the market in coastal and inland areas where foreigners tend to buy.

As a result, some genuine bargains can now be found, though potential buyers will need to do their homework to find them. You can rest assured that unscrupulous types are now busy trying to sell overpriced ‘bargains’.

Despite a recent fall in Euribor, mortgage default rates are expected to surge in 2009. This will create a big headache for mortgage lenders, and it remains to be seen how they will deal with it. It could lead to a surge of discounted properties on the market.

If so, we might soon see some mouth-watering opportunities for buyers, and, at the very least, it should be possible to find good value in Spanish property over the next year or two.

But be warned, some badly developed areas have no future at any price, and there are still plenty of pitfalls to buying property in Spain. Also, there is more to many of the “opportunities” than meets the eye. As always, stick to good locations and the best new developments.

The Bank of England is widely expected Thursday to cut the key lending rate by a further 50 basis points, or half a percentage point, to 1%.

The three months European Inter banking Offered Rate was fixed today at 2.25 per cent, down from yesterday's 2.31 and the lowest rate since October 28, 2005. The news, which means further relief for variable rate mortgage holders, since the three months rate is used as a benchmark by most banks in their variable rate, is a further consequence of the latest cut of interest rates by the European Central Bank. But at the same time it means that conditions are normal again from the point of view of the credit crunch experienced last autumn. Nowadays, as a matter of fact, the spread between base interest rate and the three months EURIBOR is just 0.25 per cent, while last October, at the highest point of the credit crunch, the spread over the base rate was 1.13 per cent.

The Spanish government yesterday slashed its economic forecasts for this year from growth of one per cent to a contraction of 1.6pc due to the global financial crisis.

It also warned of dark days ahead for Europe's fifth-largest economy.

Unemployment, already the highest in the European Union, will hit 15.9pc this year, worse than the 12.5pc forecast in July while the public sector budget deficit will clearly surpass the euro zone limit of 3pc of output in 2009, it said.

The government predicts the deficit will hit 5.8pc of gross domestic product this year instead of around 2.0pc as previously forecast.

"The financial crisis that exists at the moment at the global level has changed the scenario very drastically," Economy Minister Pedro Solbes said following a meeting which approved the new economic forecast.

The government estimates the economy expanded by 1.2pc last year compared to growth of 3.7pc in 2007. The collapse of a decade-long real estate boom due to oversupply, higher interest rates and the international credit crunch has spread to other areas, pushing the Spanish economy to the brink of its first recession since 1993.

Spain's unemployment rate hit 13.4pc in November, the highest in the 27-nation European Union, according to the bloc's statistics agency Eurostat.

The new government forecasts are in line with predictions for the Spanish economy made last year by the Washington-based International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the Paris-based Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).

The IMF predicts Spain's economy will shrink by at least 1pc this year while the OECD forecasts an economic contraction of 0.9pc.

Deputy Prime Minister Maria Teresa Fernandez de la Vega warned that "2009 will not be an easy year" but she predicted measures adopted by her socialist government to stimulate the economy will allow Spain to return to growth next year "in force."

British factory orders continued to fall sharply in November and manufacturers are their most gloomy about future output in nearly 30 years, a survey showed on Wednesday.
The Confederation of British Industry's monthly Industrial Trends survey showed the factory orders balance picked up slightly to -38 from -39 in October.
That was a touch better than analyst forecasts for a reading of -41 but still indicative of a steep contraction in demand.
The balance measuring companies' expectations for output over the coming months fell to -42 in November from -31 in October, the lowest reading since September 1980.
The figures are likely to reinforce expectations the British economy is sliding into recession and could contract for much of next year, resulting in further falls in interest rates.
"With a sharper and more prolonged UK recession in prospect, conditions are going to remain tough for some time," said Ian McCafferty, economic adviser to the CBI.
The price expectations balance fell to zero this month from +10 in October, the weakest reading since May 2006.
The survey was conducted between Oct. 23 and Nov. 12.

Mareazul at Grand Coral Playa del Carmen - Real Estate News Grand Coral Riviera Maya is the leading real estate development in the entire region.

Grand Coral Riviera Maya is a luxurious mega-development located inside the Playa del Carmen city limits.  It is adjacent to the city’s downtown district, a favourite destination on the Riviera Maya.  Grand Coral covers  531 acres with a ¾ mile stretch of pristine Caribbean beach front. The development is located thirty minutes south of the Cancun international airport.

Mareazul beach front condos playa del carmen is the signature development in the master community.

Grand Coral Riviera Maya is being developed by two of the largest and most successful banks in Spain, Bancaja and Banco Valencia. It is the largest development in the entire Rivera Maya as well as one of the largest in Mexico in terms of investment, land area and population density. The size and uniqueness of the property combined with the special characteristics of the region provide an unprecedented opportunity for international real estate investors

This mega-development will be divided into separate districts--which include the largest commercial shopping area in the region, high-end hotels, beach clubs, fashion districts, a Nick Price PGA approved 18-hole golf course and luxurious residential zones--all facing the Caribbean Sea on the Riviera Maya.

Grand Coral Riviera Maya is a totally environmentally-friendly resort.  75% of the area in the project will be landscaped grounds, natural forests, lakes and ecologically protected zones.  The second largest coral reef in the world is located directly in front of Grand Coral.  The reef is the second largest living organism on the planet and one of the oldest as well.  The developers of Grand Coral are dedicated to preserving this natural wonder so that the residents can enjoy it forever.

Grand Coral will soon be one of the top destinations in the world.

The condition of one of the horses in Cádiz last July - Photo Seprona/20minutos.es

The Guardia Civil inspected the stables at Medina Sedonia in July and found horses in a dreadful state being kept in dirty facilities. Without a technical report from the Junta they cannot act.

A British woman, Suzanne Jenkins, who has been ordered by a court in Gloucestershire in the U.K. not to own any animals for two years after causing ‘unnecessary suffering’, is currently running a finca with 35 horses in Medina Sedonia in Cádiz.

The British authorities had to put down five horses and ordered her to pay a 1000 pound fine.

Here in Spain, Seprona, the environment section of the Guardia Civil visited her property in July where they think 17 horses had died because of the dreadful conditions in which they were being kept. One was found held up in a sling, being too weak to stand on its own feet.

Suzanne Jenkins blamed the poor quality of the local water and hay for the condition of the animals, and the regional agriculture department in Andalucía confirmed that the water sent to it for analysis from the finca had a high salt content, although Ms. Jenkins spoke also of a virus. She had, it seems, made similar claims for the conditions of her animals in the United Kingdom.

20 minutos newspaper revisited the finca in Medina Sedonia last week and reports that there has been an improvement in the condition of the animals, but still considers that the facilities and cleanliness are inadequate.

However Ms. Jenkins brought 52 horses from the U.K. and now there are only 35. Animal protection groups believe the rest have died, but without a technical report from the Junta de Andalucía, the Guardia Civil say they cannot act.

Suzanne’s father Mike, told Público newspaper at the doors to the property that her daughter is now in the U.K. to appeal against her sentence there, but it begs the question how can someone banned from owning animals in Britain, calmly establish a stables here in Spain?  SOURCE: typicallyspanish

It’s official - the euro zone is in recession. Not that it’s a surprise. The financial fallout there was arguably just as serious as in the United States and in the United Kingdom. Many other countries will experience their own downturns as American and European demand for their exports dries up. But who will recover first?

Despite all the hype about internal demand in emerging economies, I think the rich countries will recover first. Almost all of the major developing economies have the United States or a European powerhouse as one of their main trading partners. Even Brazil, which does lots of business with its neighbors and China, had the United States as its top export market in 2007. It’s true that some private investors, scared by the crisis, will shift their money away from the traditional powers into emerging economies. Overall, however, those economies need the United States and the European Union to start growing again. Those Chinese factories won’t reopen until they do.

Between the United States and the European Union (or the euro zone, if you prefer, though that group leaves out the United Kingdom), I think the United States is likely to be the leader. After some early faltering, it is now acting more aggressively than Europe to create liquidity in the credit markets. It may still suffer as housing values continue to fall, but so might Europe. Moreover, while American banks and corporations are rushing to clean up their balance sheets and get through layoffs, Europe’s byzantine corporate structures may harbor yet more dirty secrets. Europe sometimes has an advantage in government action, since the executive and legislative branches of government are united in a parliamentary system, but in two months the United States will have one-party leadership. And finally, though it’s not fashionable anymore to boast about the American economy’s dynamism, it has shown itself several times to be the most resilient of the world’s economic giants. Recession in the United States may be deeper than in Europe - indeed, the American economic cycle has been broader for decades - but it may be shorter, too. Source: Herald Tribune

Halifax, Britain's biggest lender, doubled the margins on some of its most popular mortgages last night.

The lender, owned by HBOS, is only the fourth bank to reissue tracker mortgages, after they were pulled en masse from the market last week in the wake of the Bank of England's reduction in interest rates by 1.5 per cent.

Rather than passing on the cut, however, Halifax has dramatically increased the margins on its home loans pegged to the base rate by up to 100 per cent over the past month.

Yesterday it reintroduced two-year tracker deals for borrowers with a 25 per cent deposit at a rate of 5.14 per cent, or 2.14 percentage points above the Bank of England's base rate. Halifax's best tracker a month ago was 1.04 per cent above base, meaning that the margin has jumped by 1.1 percentage points, or the equivalent of £93 on the monthly capital repayments of a £150,000 mortgage.


A new five-year tracker for borrowers with a 25 per cent deposit will now carry a rate of 5.39 per cent, or 2.39 points above base. A month ago Halifax was offering five-year trackers at 1.25 points above base, increasing the rate by 1.14 points, or the equivalent of almost £100 on the monthly repayments of a £150,000 mortgage. Last week the rate on the five-year deal was 1.75 per cent above base.

Mortgage experts expressed disappointment that the new rates were higher than those announced by Abbey, Lloyds TSB and Alliance & Leicester in the past two days.

David Hollingworth, of London & Country Mortgages, a broker, said: “Halifax appears to be barely competing with the latest deals that have been unveiled by its rivals.”

Mortgage experts said that Halifax has the option of imposing a 3 per cent “collar” on tracker deals, allowing it to avoid passing on future falls in the base rate to homeowners on tracker deals.

Trackers have proved to be particularly popular among homeowners looking to remortgage in recent months because of predictions that the Bank of England will continue to cut interest rates, leading to falling monthly repayments. However, lenders have pushed up margins on deals for new customers whenever the Bank of England has cut rates, reducing homeowners' ability to benefit from the Bank's reductions.

The Bank of England said yesterday that households were struggling with more personal and mortgage debt as a ratio of their income than during the recession of the early 1990s. Its Inflation Report revealed that the ratio of household debt to annual salaries had reached 170 per cent in the three months to June this year, compared with 105 per cent in 1991. It also showed that homeowners were devoting more of their pre-tax pay to paying off their mortgage than in 1991.

The Bank said that there were fewer mortgage repayment problems than during the 1991 downturn, but said that the problem is expected to worsen.

Mark Dampier, of Hargreaves Lansdown, the financial adviser, said: “The bottom line is that many households have over-leveraged themselves and, although lower interest rates will help, the situation is set to get a lot worse. People have so much unsecured debt and large mortgages, the main focus will be on paying it all back.”

The Government has pushed mortgage lenders to ease the pressure on homeowners by cutting their standard variable rates (SVR) in line with the Bank of England's 1.5 point cut last week. However, only about 10 per cent of mortgage borrowers have deals linked to the SVR.

HSBC, Woolwich, which is owned by Barclays, and Alliance & Leicester, along with most building societies, have still not decided whether they will pass on the cut in rates.

Halifax blamed its decision to extend tracker margins on the wide gap between three-month Libor, the interbank money market that banks use to fund new tracker lending, and the base rate. It said that three-month Libor fell by only 1.07 points the day after the rate cut. Libor is at its lowest point in four years, although it is still more than 1 per cent above base. Source: Times

After tilling corn for 20 years on the banks of the Tagus River in central Spain, he didn't plant this spring. Piriz instead sold his water to arid towns in the south for 216,000 euros ($275,000), more than he would have earned on the crop.

``This is a great harvest for farmers,'' the 43-year-old said after plowing under 150 acres. He's one of 200 farmers in Aranjuez, 30 miles south of Madrid, who were paid to shut irrigation canals from the Tagus. This year they let their water meander south through 250 miles of rivers and pipelines to the buyer, a utility supplying 43 towns in parched Murcia.

Demand for water on Spain's southern Mediterranean coast has become so intense that the Murcia region, home to more than 17 golf courses and a resort boom, has begun importing billions of gallons from farmers up north. That helps keep local taps running, swimming pools full and the grass green at three Jack Nicklaus-designed courses owned by Polaris World.

Deals like Piriz's, which required approval from regional water boards and even the nation's cabinet, are set to become far easier. Spain plans to strip control from local authorities over 9.25 trillion gallons of annual water flow and hand it to a new market by 2012. The government will create 10 water banks to let rights holders including farmers sell to the highest bidder.

`The Next Petroleum'

``This is just the start, and the whole world is going to be watching Spain's experiment,'' said Deane M. Dray, a New York-based water analyst for Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and adviser to the United Nations on water issues. Dray says the life-sustaining resource will become the ``petroleum for the next century'' as demand overshoots supplies.

Governments around the globe are seeking drastic solutions to satisfy increasingly thirsty users. Australia will spend the equivalent of $2.1 billion this year buying back water from the Murray-Darling Basin to return it to stressed wetlands and rivers. Cyprus and Barcelona are importing water in tankers and building desalination plants to make sea water drinkable.

Southern Californian farmers have fallowed land to sell their water to cities amid a drought and diminishing flows from the Colorado River. Around the world, water consumption will double in the next 20 years, twice the rate of global population growth, a Goldman Sachs report predicted in March.

In Spain, the shift in power toward resorts and homes threatens to reduce crop harvests and undercut the country's position as Europe's second-biggest producer of fruit and vegetables after France. Farms, with rights to consume 68 percent of Spain's water, are being approached to bail out the arid south, which suffered its driest eight months on record through May, officials say.

`All About Money'

``It's all about money,'' Aranjuez environmental chief Olga Rincon said from her office by the town's main square. ``Water that once nourished our land was sold to the south just to keep their unsustainable economies of golf courses and resorts going. It's plainly irresponsible.''

Land that had grown corn and wheat is now idle around Aranjuez, the town where Spanish King Felipe II built his 16th century spring retreat to escape the dry heat of Madrid. Farmers including Piriz sold 9.7 billion gallons of this year's supply for 11 million euros to the Murcian water provider Mancomunidad de Taibilla. That was 36 times what they paid for the water.

The deal helps cut a supply deficit in Murcia that widened in 2008 to its highest in more than 75 years. A sub-economy of golf courses and water-intensive farms that grow melons and oranges has added to the squeeze in Murcia, which averages about 12 inches of annual rainfall.

One-Strip Airport

The economy in Murcia, an 85-mile-wide area with its own regional government, doubled in size over the last eight years. It was boosted by a construction and real estate boom that drew golf fans and sun-seekers from northern Europe.

On the road between Murcia's regional capital and its one- runway airport, rows of white holiday apartments are being built for a growing expatriate community that can fly in and play at the nearby La Torre Golf Resort or two other Jack Nicklaus- designed golf courses within a short drive.

The Segura basin, which provides Murcia's water supplies, is the nation's driest. Patches of land teeter on being classified as desert. Strips outside the boundaries of resorts, homes or farm-irrigation zones lie cracked and caked with dust. Segura's reservoirs and storage facilities are the driest of Spain's 10 water districts.

``Demand just far outstrips supply down here,'' said Mario Andres Urrea, head of planning at the Segura water agency that oversees the area's needs. ``But we're very proud of the fact that so far we haven't had to impose any water restrictions on the people living around here.''

Building Boom

In the last decade the region tripled the number of permits granted for new homes and golf apartments. Local authorities plan to allow residential water use to expand by a fifth over the next two decades. Many golf courses use water recycled from the holiday homes built on their perimeter.

The construction boom has helped drive water demand to more than twice the region's own resources. Murcia largely relies on a 180-mile pipeline that transports 143 billion gallons of water a year from Castile-Leon, angering citizens from that northern region. That supply is capped, so extra demand in the future must be met by buying water elsewhere.

Spain's water shortage may worsen. The environment ministry predicted that global warming may push up average temperatures in the Mediterranean country by 2.5 degrees Celsius (4.5 degrees Fahrenheit) by 2050, reducing rainfall by 10 percent, depriving rivers, reservoirs and aquifers. During that period demand will increase, regional water agencies forecast.

Squeezing Water

The national government's planned public water banks will be used to ``reassign historic water fairly, efficiently and with sustainability,'' according to the official Water Plan on the ministry's Web site. Hinting that rates will rise, the program promotes an active water market to make the price better reflect ``the true cost of obtaining and treating'' water.

Also planned are more desalination plants, better infrastructure and conservation campaigns.

``I understand the government's situation,'' Aranjuez's Rincon said. ``They need to ensure that everyone gets their fair share of water. But this just makes a business out of the water shortage. Farmers are just going to continue selling their water as long as the price is high enough to justify it.''

Imports to Murcia aren't enough to keep even local farmers flush with water. Antonio Fernandez, who grows peaches and apricots around Yachar, in the north of Murcia, said from a group of 10 farmer friends that only three remain in business.

Tearing up Plums

It is mid-afternoon and time to turn off the tap that keeps his field alive. After three hours of watering land, Fernandez has used up his daily allowance for fruit that normally would need at least six hours of water a day.

``My water bills have doubled,'' he said from beneath a hat that keeps out the midday sun. ``The choice is clear: You either pay these prices or you stop watering your crops.'' After eight months without a drop of rain between October and May, he tore up half his seven-acre farm of oranges and plums to ensure enough water for the remaining crops.

Agriculture in the region expanded rapidly under dictator Francisco Franco, who saw the potential for harnessing the 2,800 hours of sunshine Murcia receives a year on average. Franco was nicknamed Paco Piscinas, or Frankie Swimming Pools, for all the reservoirs he built for the industry. Today, they're not enough.

The Murcian water agency has reduced supplies to farmers like Fernandez to keep residential levels unchanged. That spurred him to look north and offer twice what he was currently paying to import water.

``They cut our allowances down in dry periods and everyone else -- homeowners, hoteliers, golf courses -- is allowed to carry on normally,'' he said. ``It's much easier to bully the farmer, but if this continues there'll be nothing left of us.''  Source: bloomberg

As financial markets tumble, the world’s housing markets have continued to slide during the year to end of second-quarter 2008. Inflation-adjusted house prices fell in 21 out of the 33 countries for which there is up-to-date published data.

The Baltics, the US, the UK and Ireland led the global decline during the year to end-Q2 2008, the latest date for which comprehensive global statistics are available.

The biggest house price declines took place in Latvia, previously a leader of the global house price boom. House prices in Riga have fallen by 21.23% in nominal terms during the year to end-Q2 2008, and 33.08% in real terms. Prices in Estonia’s Tallinn fell during the year by 11.02% in nominal terms, and 14.06% in real terms.

Quarterly data suggests that things are getting worse, with declines in inflation-adjusted house prices over the quarter in all except nine of the 33 countries tracked. Latvia’s Riga saw the largest quarterly decline during second quarter of 2008, with average dwelling prices falling 5.20% in nominal terms, and 8.16% in real terms.

While quarterly data are subject to seasonal variations and are thus less reliable, the slide suggests that the situation is worsening.

Dramatic downturns

Since last year, there has been a dramatic turn-around in the world’s housing markets. Only five countries out of 33, at this stage last year, had seen year-on-year declines in house prices in real terms. This year’s total is 21.

Even in countries which have continued to record house prices rises over the past year such as China (Shanghai was up 36.32% y-o-y in nominal terms at the end of second quarter 2008, 27.28% in inflation-adjusted terms), transaction volumes have fallen sharply, suggesting that buyers are now nervous.

While property markets in some regions such as the Middle East apparently remain in boom, it is hard to confirm this by reliable data. With the exception of Israel, none of Middle East’s property registries, statistical institutes or central banks publish good data on housing markets.

A final thought: It seems interesting that Slovakia’s house prices are still accelerating, having risen 32.20% this year (a rise of 25.57% in inflation-adjusted terms), as against a rise of 20.47% year-on-year to end of second quarter 2007 (a rise of 17.56% in inflation-adjusted terms).

Clearly, the boom in Eastern Europe is not entirely finished. There have also been strong price increases in Monaco, Montenegro and Albania, although no official house price statistics are available.

Rescue efforts

The efforts to rescue the world’s housing markets are becoming increasingly global.

In the US, the authorities are seeking a US$700 billion 'mother of all bailouts' package to purchase almost all of the country’s bad mortgage debt in an effort to unfreeze the nation’s credit markets. In the year to end-second quarter 2008, house prices in major US cities fell 15.4% (18.9% in real terms) from a year earlier, according to the Case-Shiller house price index. It was the sixth consecutive quarter that the house price index dropped year-on-year.

In the UK, the stamp duty exemption has been raised to £175,000 from £125,000 for houses purchased from September 2008 to September 2009. The government also unveiled a £1 billion package to assist first time home buyers and households struggling with their mortgage payments. In September 2007 Northern Rock, one of UK’s largest lenders was bailed by the Bank of England. In the year to end-second quarter 2008, house prices in the UK fell 6.33% (9.77% in real terms) from a year earlier, according to Nationwide.

In Spain, the government released a €3 billion rescue package. Certain real estate investment companies were given tax breaks to rent out unsold new homes for a fixed period. In the year to end-second quarter 2008, house prices in Spain rose 2.00% (a fall of 2.49% in real terms) from a year earlier, according to official statistics (which are widely believed to understate the problem).

In Ireland, the 2009 budget will include a stimulus package providing assistance to first-time homebuyers. During the year to end-second quarter 2008, house prices in Ireland fell 9.65% (13.92% in real terms), according to official statistics.

In South Korea, the government is set for tax breaks and easing restrictions on construction. In the year to end-second quarter 2008, house prices in South Korea rose 4.94% (a fall of 0.88% in real terms), according to official statistics.

Thailand and Indonesia are mulling the relaxation of foreign ownership limits to lift their housing markets. During the year to end-second quarter 2008, house prices in Indonesia rose 5.60% (a fall of 4.18% in real terms), according to official statistics.
Source: BI-ME

Who will win, Obama or McCain ?

The historian answers your questions, such as 'Do we face recession or depression?' and 'Where should I invest my cash?'

Who would you like to see win the US election? Ian Barker, Brighton

I was one of John McCain's foreign policy advisers when he was campaigning for the Republican nomination, but haven't been involved since the presidential campaign became a two-horse race. I think McCain was by a wide margin the best of the Republican candidates, but I can't see him beating Barack Obama, who has run one of the most inspiring and at the same time disciplined campaigns of modern times.

Like so many historic events, this has a financial back-story. Without the credit crunch I think they'd be neck and neck. But the economic crisis is surely going to hand victory to the Democrat, whose cool, calm and collected manner are an asset at a time of panic and pessimism. I will not be sorry. Obama has the potential to be a great president – and who could fail to be uplifted by the prospect of a black man as commander in chief, 40 years after the assassination of Martin Luther King?

What do you think are the biggest challenges he will face? Stephen Mottram, Newcastle

The economy, the economy and the economy – followed by Iran, followed by his own party in Congress. The trouble is that Obama's plan to spend around $1.3 trillion in tax cuts and new spending is going to be very hard to implement when over a trillion has already been committed by his predecessor to the financial bailout. At some point the bond market may take fright at the explosion of government borrowing. Alternatively, the US may be heading for a period of Japanese-style stagnation and deflation, no matter how much the Treasury throws at the problem. Neither scenario is going to make the next president's life easy.

Is the US in terminal decline? MARK SUTTON, COLCHESTER

No empire lasts forever, but the US itself is not in terminal decline. It has an immensely successful political system. Its economy remains the most attractive place in the world for entrepreneurs and innovators. It's social system is wonderfully good at integrating new immigrants. Sure, there are problems, but I would say the EU looks much more vulnerable at the moment. And let's not forget that the US is still miles ahead of the competition when it comes to military power.

What does Obama's candidacy say about race relations in the US? TINA WEEKS, BRISTOL

That there has been a real change of attitudes. Some Americans may still harbour racial prejudice, but it is no longer socially acceptable to express it. That's one of the most heartening changes I have witnessed in the U.S. since I first started going there in 1981.

Will the world face recession in the next few years, or depression? PATRICK HOBSON, LONDON SE8

Call it a Great Recession. It won't be as bad as the Great Depression of 1929-32 (which actually dragged on until the Second World War in many countries). But it will almost certainly be a deeper and longer recession than anything we've experienced since the mid 1970s.

Given recent events, has your view of markets changed? MADDY PHILLIPS, LONDON N19

My new book The Ascent of Money was written in the expectation that a major liquidity crisis was going to strike financial markets in the near future, and that we would see a herd-like switch from greed to fear. This happens quite frequently in financial history. So I am not surprised and my view hasn't changed. As Churchill said of democracy, the free market is the worst of all possible systems, except for all those others that have been tried from time to time. In the book, I try to show that the financial system has an evolutionary character. That means that periodic crises are inevitable.

Where would you advise me to invest/save my money at the moment? DAVID ADAMS, BIRMINGHAM

Well, you're doing the right thing by saving. The key thing is to reduce indebtedness if you can, because it's leverage that's most dangerous at a time like this. A diversified portfolio of stocks and bonds, domestic and foreign securities, some real estate and some other assets (like art) remains the best bet. But the devil lies in the detail.

There are some bargains out there among small-cap US companies. Right now, I would be searching Silicon Valley for the next Google. Remember: Microsoft and Apple were both established in the depths of the mid-1970s stagflation.

Should Britain join the euro? ELLEN POWELL, LONDON W6

No. The last thing you want, especially in a financial crisis, is to have given away control of your monetary policy.

Where will the balance of global power lie in 20 years' time? Will the Asian Century be well and truly up and running? MICHAEL WILKES, ALDERSHOT

In The War of the World, I argued that the Asian century got underway nearly a century ago with the rise of Japan and its emergence as a credible rival to the European empires! Japan's had the second biggest economy in the world for decades now, so this is not a new story. The real issue is how far and for how long China can sustain the growth we have seen in the past three decades. If it can, then by mid-century it will be the biggest economy in the world. Then we may need to ask if we are entering the Chinese century. But remember: Japan was also projected to overtake the US and never made it. Economic history is seldom a smooth upward curve.

What moment is there from financial history from which we can most profitably learn? HENRY JOHNSON, NORWICH

I keep thinking that we are living through 1914 without the war – a huge liquidity crisis requiring all kinds of extraordinary emergency measures and extensions of state power over the financial system. In the past this only happened in time of war.

Who do you think will win the next UK election and why? BRIAN DOUGLAS, CARDIFF

The Conservatives because the Labour Party has so obviously failed to deliver the kind of improvements to public services that it promised more than 10 years ago, and has also presided over the worst financial crisis since an earlier Labour government had to call in the IMF. Things are going to be very ugly for the UK economy next year. If Gordon Brown were a stock, I would short him. His recent revival in the polls is a sucker's rally.

What do you think about the way the BBC has handled the Russell Brand/Jonathan Ross affair? LYNN THOMAS, LONDON NW6

I am afraid I do not know who these people are. Nor was I aware that they are having an affair.

Should the BBC be privatised? LIAM BRYAN, WORCESTER

Yes. There is no credible justification for the licence fee, which simply subsidises one bloated broadcaster.

Who do you think was the greatest British prime minister. And who was the greatest US president? GAVIN PHILLIPS, CANTERBURY

Churchill was the greatest prime minister, Roosevelt the greatest president.

You wrote a history of the Rothschild family. What do you make of George Osborne's recent brush with one of the younger inheritors? IAN CLARKE, DEVIZES

I think the episode merely illustrates the danger of talking to journalists about private conversations. This applies whether or not the conversation was with Peter Mandelson, whether or not it was on a yacht, and whether or not a Rothschild was present.

Which historian has had the biggest influence on you? CHARLIE BLAKE, MANCHESTER

Probably A.J.P. Taylor, who was a wonderfully gifted writer of diplomatic history, but my principal debts as a financial historian are to Charles Kindleberger, David Landes and Fritz Stern.

How do you manage to produce so many books so quickly? NIGEL PORTER, BARNET

By neglecting my family.

Niall Feguson's 'The Ascent of Money' has just been published by Allen Lane at £25
Source: independent

No banks have collapsed for more than a month and interest rates look set to come down next Thursday - so are much-needed cheaper mortgages just around the corner? Sadly not.

A few fixed-rate deals came down in response to the most recent 0.5 point base-rate cut, but trackers - the mortgages of choice during times of falling interest rates - are more expensive than they were this time last year, when the Bank of England base rate was 1.25 percentage points higher than the current rate, of 4.5 per cent.

In October 2007 the average rate on a tracker mortgage stood at 6.23 per cent, compared with 6.27 now, according to Moneyfacts.co.uk, the comparison website. Michelle Slade, one of its analysts, says: “Lenders are just not passing on cuts. [They] are factoring in a much bigger margin for risk than ever before and as a result mortgage rates remain high.”

The last time that the base rate was 4.5percent, borrowers could have obtained a rate of 4.25 per cent on a two-year tracker. Today the best rate on offer is 5.99percent. More than 30per cent of applications for loans worth more than 75percent are being declined by LloydsTSB, often because small details, such as a home phone number, have not been filled out. Such is the paranoia of banks.

Restrictions are becoming harsher still. Cheltenham&Gloucester has introduced a new fee for borrowers who want to move and rent out their homes by converting their mortgage into a buy-to-let loan. The wait for respite continues. Source: times

The Bank of England failed to respond to warning signs of a looming recession and had been wrong to delay cutting interest rates until too late to stop growth contracting and unemployment rising sharply, a member of the Bank's monetary policy committee (MPC) said last night.

Speaking as the US Federal Reserve cut interest rates to just 1% in an attempt to halt a slump in activity, David Blanchflower launched an outspoken attack on his eight MPC colleagues, saying the Bank had been too optimistic about the UK's ability to survive the global crisis, and Britain would now endure 18 months of falling output as it felt the full impact.

The Bank is expected to follow the Fed's lead by cutting at least half a percentage point off UK rates next week, although some analysts want a one point cut after news the economy shrank by 0.5% in the third quarter of this year.

Blanchflower's intervention came as David Cameron attempted to pile the pressure on Gordon Brown when the Tory leader challenged the prime minister to admit that his fiscal rules were now dead and he was planning a "spending splurge".In their most bruising encounter in the crisis, Brown hit back at prime minister's questions by accusing the Tories of mixed messages, saying in one breath that it was right to increase borrowing in a recession and saying in another that it was not.

Cameron asked of the fiscal rules: "Why will he not now admit that they are dead? Let us just remember them - he used to be so proud of them. Rule one was: 'Only borrow to invest'; now he is having to borrow to pay for unemployment benefit. That rule is dead. Rule two was: 'Don't have debt over 40% of national income.' Even on his own fiddled figures, that rule is now dead. Why will he not admit that the rules failed to deliver responsibility in the good years and that, as soon as the bad times came, they collapsed completely?"

In a speech last night, chancellor Alistair Darling said it would be "perverse" to stick rigidly to the rules during a downturn.

Blanchflower was a lone voice on the MPC calling for cuts in interest rates this summer. Speaking in Canterbury last night he criticised fellow MPC members for ignoring his warnings. "I believe the trend has been apparent for some time. The synchronised downturn in so many surveys should have led us to realise sooner that the UK economy was entering a recession," he said.

"If rates are not cut aggressively [when the MPC meets next week] we do face the prospect of a relatively deep and long-lasting recession."

In his speech, he said tighter credit conditions imposed by banks had yet to be fully felt. Policymakers faced an "unusually severe" international financial problem, possibly more significant than 1929, a crash which principally involved bank failures in the US. "The current difficulties in financial markets are more comparable to what happened in world war one, when stock exchanges in several countries closed for extended periods."

The MPC had been reluctant to cut rates during the summer as inflation rose to a 16-year-high of 5.2% in September.

Blanchflower said the MPC had over-reacted to the threat of higher imported oil and food prices repeating the 1970s inflationary spiral. But workers' bargaining power was weaker now, with little chance that they could push up wages in response to rising prices.

"In its last health check on the economy, released in August, the Bank said it expected output to be flat over the coming year, with employment falling a little. Output growth was expected to recover in 2009 as energy prices fell, the credit crunch eased and a weaker pound helped exports. This was an optimistic view," Blanchflower said. "Clearly output is now beginning to contract, but I think this likelihood was apparent in August."

He added that at last month's MPC meeting some had argued for higher borrowing costs. "I was alone in voting for an immediate cut of half a percentage point. I am concerned about the detrimental effect of recent events in financial markets on the UK economy," he said, adding that the 0.5% drop in GDP had occurred mainly before this autumn's market meltdown.  Source: The Guardian

The figure equates to the net wealth of all British households, companies and official bodies even after taking the country's enormous debts into account.

Net assets rose by a record £506bn in 2007, an 8% increase on the year before, according to the ONS.

Despite debts of £1.7trillion, this still means each UK household was worth £300,000 and each individual worth £125,000, on average.

The fall in the stock markets and the slump in property prices will have wiped out around £1trillion of the total.

Housing continued to be the country's most valuable asset, worth over £4trillion, around 60% of net worth and up 10% on the previous year.

Stocks, shares, bank accounts and pension plans form a much larger gross asset, worth almost £26trillion, but are more than outweighed by the nation's debts, leaving a net negative contribution of £380bn. Other net assets include offices, factories, vehicles, public non-financial corporations and local government.

Offices and factories and the national fleet of cars, lorries, aircraft and ships make up most of the rest of the national wealth.

When the figures are broken down by ownership, householders come out on top

Despite Britons' notorious appetite for debt, they still have a net worth of $4trillion after £1.5trillion of mortgages and debts have been accounted for. Non-profit institutions such as charities, universities, churches and trade unions accounted for most of the remaining positive net worth.

The biggest liabilities were private non-financial corporations (-£546bn), financial corporations (-£393bn) and central government, which is £202bn in the red.
Source: telegraph

The number of new mortgages edged up slightly in September from the previous month’s record low but at 33,000 home loans, the volume remains well below the average of the previous six months.

Consumer lending data from the Bank of England, released on Wednesday, show that overall, net lending secured on homes – new and re-mortgages – was £2.2bn. However, net lending in August – the value of loans extended minus repayments of principal received – was revised downward from the £0.1bn rise previously reported and was actually a net negative at -£0.1bn.


Howard Archer, economist at Global Insight, noted it was the first ever month of negative net mortgage lending since the Bank’s series began in 1993.

That total number of mortgages outstanding in the UK could actually shrink is illustrative of the extent to which credit is being restricted in the economy. Falling house prices are deterring new buyers from entering the market because they believe more bargains will emerge later while lenders are becoming more risk averse and demanding larger down-payments..

“Despite the very limited improvement from August, the Bank of England mortgage data for September still showed that housing market activity continued to be decimated by the highly damaging combination of stretched buyer affordability and tight lending practices,” Mr Archer said.

He suggested that the latest lending data, combined with evidence of a deepening economic downturn, will reinforce pressure on the Bank’s Monetary Policy Committee to cut rates by half a percentage point to 4.0 per cent when it meets next week.

Re-mortgaging levels in September also edged up slightly to 72,000, but remained below the 82,000 average level of the previous six months. Total loans backed by homes as collateral were 143,000 in September. They had averaged 169,000 over the previous six months.

Meanwhile, the Building Societies Association (BSA) said net mortgage lending by its members has turned positive again, rising to £314 in September from -£37m in august, but remains 47 per cent below lending levels in the year ago period.

Adrian Coles, director general of the BSA, said: “With the housing market depressed as house prices continue falling and with confidence amongst potential homebuyers low, it is no surprise that mortgage lending is down on last year.” He added that mortgage lending is unlikely to recover “for some time.”
Source: The Financial Times

Prime Minister Gordon Brown said he is ready to increase spending and borrowing to shore up the U.K. economy as it falls into its first recession in 17 years.

The government needs to maintain investment in job-creating public works as part of a ``comprehensive'' effort to counter the slump that includes the 50 billion-pound ($79 billion) bank- rescue plan and Bank of England interest-rate cuts, he said.

``The responsible course of action is more borrowing for the investment that is necessary both now and for the longer term,'' Brown told an audience of economists and businessmen in London today. He said borrowing will fall as a share national income when the economy recovers and generates more tax receipts.

The comments indicate he and Chancellor of the Exchequer Alistair Darling are preparing to abandon a decade-old pledge to limit debt to 40 percent of gross domestic product. Brown last week acknowledged that Britain is tipping into a recession after the economy shrank in the third quarter at the fastest pace since 1990.

Darling may use his Mais lecture on Oct. 29 to formally scrap the fiscal rules that Brown introduced in 1997 when the Labour Party came to power, The Financial Times reported today.
 

He is planning to replace them with new targets for cutting borrowing once the economy is on a stronger footing, and will announce the new fiscal regime in his pre-budget report this year, the newspaper reported, without saying where it got the information.

Public Works

The government last week pledged to bring forward projects scheduled for after 2010 to spur the U.K. economy, which contracted 0.5 percent from the second quarter as the financial crisis ravaged industries from banking to construction.

Debt was 37.9 percent of GDP in September, compared with 36.2 percent a year earlier. Including the liabilities at Northern Rock Plc, the mortgage lender that was nationalized in February, it was already above the ceiling, at 43.4 percent.

Debt may rise to 50 percent of national income when the recent nationalization of Bradford & Bingley Plc and the pledge to buy stakes in cash-strapped banks are taken into account, according to the Institute for Fiscal Studies.

``You maintain the high levels of investment that you've got to prepare for the future,'' Brown said. ``You help people fairly through difficult times, and that means that your fiscal policy must support your monetary policy. There is no one measure; there is a comprehensive set of measures that are going to take us through these difficult times.''

`Out of Necessity'

The Conservative opposition says Brown spent too much when the economy was growing during his decade as finance minister.

``What they're talking about is borrowing out of necessity, not out of virtue,'' George Osborne, Conservative economic spokesman, said today on BBC Radio 4. ``The problem here is that the borrowing situation is very, very much worse because we enter into this recession with very weak public finances. That's not a deliberate plan; that is what economic circumstances dictate.''

Britain had its biggest budget deficit since 1946 in the six months through September as tax receipts stagnated, and economists say the shortfall may reach 7 percent of gross domestic product over the next two years, more than double the 3 percent European Union limit.

A group of economists wrote to The Sunday Telegraph newspaper yesterday, warning against further government spending as a way of stimulating the economy.

Insofar as slowdowns ``are to be managed at all, the best tools are monetary and not fiscal ones,'' the 14 economists wrote. The focus on public projects and higher spending is ``misguided.''
source: bloomberg