PubChampion

If you've lived in Germany, you must know how messed up and over-regulated its economy is. There's been no visible growth for ages, at least in the West.

The trouble with Europe and the euro is that it is in the state of permanent stagnation. When was the last time the Euro zone grew by 3% a year?

masterbaits

bmw and merc are an example of the german economy.

Bmw used to be a marque , now its a german ford , merc used to by another word for reliability ... well that gone the way of the dodo.German economy is based on financial ways from the end of wwII , maybe they dont want to go the economic way that was the real reason for both wars.

Germans dont get caught up in the housing market like the brits , whom are more like the septics , in that they have been duped that house prices will always go up...The german will get a one hundred year mortgage for a home , not a future investment based on increasing house price.

Even today you can get a pile in germany for prices along the same as bulgaria if you know where to look.

I think I posted on here before about the portuguese taxi driver I used a while back told me that merc gave huge discount to use thier cars as taxis over here.If rover say had done that then guess what would have happened at eu hq.

enterprise1999

You'll find we will devalue the pound again making it worth say 20% less than it is at the moment......... therefore pension and other state payouts wont cost the state as much, therefore reducing costs. I think you'll find companys going pop and restarting or making people redundent and changing the job title and the new pensions wont be final salary............. The goverment is not totally stupid this is all being engineered..... Good job they have a country full of sheep and workers from easten europe who dont complain and if they do we'll make the Ukraine part of Europe.... Lots of cheap labour there.
The one thing every one seems to have forgotten is :-

You cant buy cheaper than China..... they have millions and millions of surfs..... So dont even think about it.

Happy new year

enterprise1999

By the way masterbaits....... Mercs are built in Mexico now..... Bit like our range rovers being Indian.
Any one got a Trubant for sale?

encodeme

Its a view, although even the Chinese want western standards....and that when their inflation will kick in.....etc..etc...However in the midst of this credit crisis there is no need to worry about that yet.

enterprise1999

I think you'll already find the CIA and other western agencies in China spreading discontent........ Wars cold or hot dont do any good......... Russia has the gas tap and we built the gas pipe to europe to sell all our norh sea gas of with........ weve flogged all our family silver off. So dont save any money in a bank.......... it will be worth less when you come to draw it out.... It's a way for the goverment to get us to spend. January will see interest rates go down, could be to zero..... So no point in saving in the UK........ But there will be people with investments elsewhere waiting to move in on the UK once everything is at a Woolworths sale price...... But Pound notes wont be doing the buying.

bejaboz

The following link may provide a little boost to the ailing Pound.

http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/investi...page_id=3&ct=5

But only time will tell.

guesswork

Things are improving a little

http://newsvote.bbc.co.uk/1/shared/f...3/intraday.stm

enterprise1999

The Uk has issued sterling bonds with a gauranteed buy back value........ Lets hope we can get down to a good exchange rate for the rest of my savings before people start to cash them in. 85p per Euro by March would be good.

anna58

€0,989 to the pound when my state pension came this morning, and they usually py a better rate than my occupational pension!!

mshlgw

Currently trading at 1.0945. Heading in the right direction.

encodeme

Its not making a bad show at the moment 1.10 and pushing!!

bejaboz

Following from a piece on the This Is Money web site is interesting.

Meanwhile, the euro plunged against the pound after extremely low inflation figures from the Continent added to expectations the European Central Bank would also slash interest rates aggressively.

As posters have said, the ECB is now having to play catch up with the BoE.

enterprise1999

Lets hope we dont screw it when the BoE anounce interest rates on Thursday....... Mandelson is still pulling strings in the Euro direction..... why did Brown let him back in?
I think in the end it's going to be every man for himself.......

encodeme

Wouldn't be wonderful if the BOE put the rate by .25%.
Its a pity UK can't change their declartion date and let ECB declare first