Well that was fun to watch. Starship launch window tonight one hour from “4pm CT” (why do Americans do that?), which is 22:00 UTC, my 02:00 Friday which is slightly annoying!
With stellar growth like that its just as well the airhead has ramped up taxes to cool the economy down
Waiting until the end of the month to enter the PB competition has allowed a few more data points to be in the mix. My first though of 1% seems a little optimistic now.
How is Germany doing and the main issues in doing business? Worth having a punt on any German stocks?
Insolvency practitioners are looking forward to a bumper year.
Once was offered a competitor in Hanau but the AG selling it only wanted to sell the equipment and stock, not the actual company. We snatched their hands off to get capacity out of the market. Always found it odd they didn't want to TUPE the employees over (or whatever the German equivalent is).
Couple of people at my work today saying their pension pots have fallen and blaming Reeves.
A decade ago we would not have had people checking their wealth on a daily basis.
Given the public sector background of so many Labour politicians I wonder if they realise how quickly people will get annoyed if personal wealth happens to reduce at all.
Asset values have fallen so many times in the last decade and a half that I’m surprised anyone gets excited about it anymore.
They slumped during the financial crisis, then recovered then slumped again in the Eurozone crisis and stayed slumped for ages, then crept up, slumped every time the Fed threatened to reduce QE, slumped with the Brexit vote, then crept up again, slumped with Covid, recovered, slumped when Russia invaded.
All the while annuity rates went through the floor and stayed there for years, until they finally rose again with the recent inflation. Pension funds have been in surplus for the first time in yonks.
I'm not talking about defined benefit pension funds, I'm talking about defined contribution pension pots.
Which can easily go up and down by thousands each day.
When someone sees that their own personal pension pot is down a few thousand that day they tend to be displeased.
And when that coincides with talk about the Chancellor 'crashing the market' they then place blame (whether justified or not).
You might like to compare how much pension asset values can change to those of various tax and benefit changes.
A 1p reduction in beer duty or even a £200 WFA loss are small compared to someone who thinks they're £2k down because of a fall in their pension pot value.
You're comparing chalk and cheese though as assets do not equal annuities, unless you are being unclear with your language chosen.
The annuity value of their assets will be considerably lower than their total asset value.
WFA is an annuity which is why it was absurdly generous to people who did not need it and cost the taxpayer billions of pounds.
To purchase a £200 pa annuity would cost massively more than £2000 of assets.
People don't think about annuity rates until they actually retire and given the low annuity rates during ZIRP the value of the pension pot has become much more focussed upon with many people not taking out an annuity.
The replacement of defined benefit pension with defined contribution pensions and the ease of viewing them online means we have a different aspect to personal finances than we did a generation ago or even a decade ago.
Workers can quickly build up a pension pot of tens of thousands any by they reach their 40s and 50s many will have pension pots of hundreds of thousands.
The value of such a financial asset becomes important and any sharp changes noticed.
Couple of people at my work today saying their pension pots have fallen and blaming Reeves.
A decade ago we would not have had people checking their wealth on a daily basis.
Given the public sector background of so many Labour politicians I wonder if they realise how quickly people will get annoyed if personal wealth happens to reduce at all.
Asset values have fallen so many times in the last decade and a half that I’m surprised anyone gets excited about it anymore.
They slumped during the financial crisis, then recovered then slumped again in the Eurozone crisis and stayed slumped for ages, then crept up, slumped every time the Fed threatened to reduce QE, slumped with the Brexit vote, then crept up again, slumped with Covid, recovered, slumped when Russia invaded.
All the while annuity rates went through the floor and stayed there for years, until they finally rose again with the recent inflation. Pension funds have been in surplus for the first time in yonks.
I'm not talking about defined benefit pension funds, I'm talking about defined contribution pension pots.
Which can easily go up and down by thousands each day.
When someone sees that their own personal pension pot is down a few thousand that day they tend to be displeased.
And when that coincides with talk about the Chancellor 'crashing the market' they then place blame (whether justified or not).
You might like to compare how much pension asset values can change to those of various tax and benefit changes.
A 1p reduction in beer duty or even a £200 WFA loss are small compared to someone who thinks they're £2k down because of a fall in their pension pot value.
You're comparing chalk and cheese though as assets do not equal annuities, unless you are being unclear with your language chosen.
The annuity value of their assets will be considerably lower than their total asset value.
WFA is an annuity which is why it was absurdly generous to people who did not need it and cost the taxpayer billions of pounds.
To purchase a £200 pa annuity would cost massively more than £2000 of assets.
Annuity rates are the best they have been for 15 years, and UK equity markets near all time highs, gilt and interest rates at 15 year highs too.
Anyone complaining that Reeves has trashed their pension has clearly got very poor investments. Things haven't been so good for savers since the GFC.
Not good for borrowers maybe, but anyone with savings is doing well at the moment.
Here's GB news saying a big boost for savers with pensions:
They're not claiming that Reeves has trashed their pension, they're saying that Reeves has cost them money.
And a £2,000 reduction in their pension pot is the equivalent of ten years of WFA.
Its a sense of loss which they then 'blame the government' whether fair or not.
Now that £2,000 fall has likely followed substantial rises over the past year and hopefully substantial rises in the upcoming year but the traditional pattern is that people are far less likely to give credit to government for rises than they are to blame it for falls.
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The replacement of defined benefit pension with defined contribution pensions and the ease of viewing them online means we have a different aspect to personal finances than we did a generation ago or even a decade ago.
Workers can quickly build up a pension pot of tens of thousands any by they reach their 40s and 50s many will have pension pots of hundreds of thousands.
The value of such a financial asset becomes important and any sharp changes noticed.
And a £2,000 reduction in their pension pot is the equivalent of ten years of WFA.
Its a sense of loss which they then 'blame the government' whether fair or not.
Now that £2,000 fall has likely followed substantial rises over the past year and hopefully substantial rises in the upcoming year but the traditional pattern is that people are far less likely to give credit to government for rises than they are to blame it for falls.