Archive for April, 2010

First to Default ?

Monday, April 5th, 2010

Very interesting article on the BBC today on the impact of the bailout of Greece and how it will spread beyond Greece’s shores

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/8603206.stm

Sovereign debt is the biggest economic theme of this year. But I believe it will become an even bigger theme in 2011 and 2012 when the risks of default become even bigger, and countries start having to pay more to borrow money.

So with that in mind, the question of the day is  who will be the first to default ?

Greece - will put up with austerity measures for now, but will find it increasingly harder and more expensive to roll over debt and the population is getting restless.

Spain – in a similar position to Greece, but arguably with more chance of growing their way out of the problem

Portugal – also in a similar position to Greece

UK - hasn’t needed to go to the bond markets as quantitative easing has bought up $200bn of governement bonds – what happens when we need to go back

US – debt the likes of which hasn’t been seen before (billions have become trillions), with states like California effectively bankrupt  

Dubai – broke ?

My money is on Greece first, first rescheduling and then defaulting and  others not far behind ….

Posted in Economics, State of the Nation, Uncategorized, World politics | 8 Comments »

Moaning Geordies :-)

Monday, April 5th, 2010

For the last year we’ve had to listen to Geordies moaning about the disgraceful state of their club, but yet tonight they only need a point from a game at home to take them up to the Premiership (in all likelihood as champions too). Which arguably positions them as stronger than at any time since the Sir Bobby Robson / Glenn Roeder days.

And given that 2 out of the 3 promoted clubs last year have stayed up, and the premiership is likely to have teams such as Wigan, Hull, Stoke and Wolves in it next year, I’d say their prospects for staying in the premiership are fairly good.

So the question is, has the last 12 months actually turned out to be a good 12 months in the history of Newcastle Utd, and now they have made it back, what do they need to do to re-establish themselves in the Premiership ?

Posted in Football | 5 Comments »