European Interest Rates
More momentum on rate cuts in the Eurozone as expectations grew for cuts starting in March and totalling 140bps in 2024. Equally in the UK cuts of 130bps starting in June are being pencilled in to market calendars. What this means is that GBP/EUR is looking more than especially good value at 1.1685 at the moment- just in time for Christmas market shopping on the Continent.
Smart Meters
UK readers will be familiar with their energy provider offering if not pressuring them to install smart meters. A truly illuminating statistic is that of the 33 million smart meters installed to date….2.7 million are either not working at all or transmitting incorrect data. Writing as someone who has refused on numerous occasions to take a smart meter, I mistakenly thought that my own heating provider Communal Energy Partners would be able to install a simple non smart meter to measure consumption: wrong. After 9 months we have a green light but the meter is unable to communicate with the central hub that is laughingly named, Guru. That did not stop CEP billing me for a month’s consumption in October of £1060 despite the heating not yet being switched on.
GBP/USD 1.2605.
Global Real Estate
Undeterred by the weak Yen , Japanese buyers of global real estate are out in force and are buying up three times as much property as the average of the past 15 years in the last year. Seeking yield and that old chestnut diversification, Japanese buyers have been buying up real estate in particular in the USA, India and Australia.
USD/JPY 147.15.
Knockin on Heavens Door
This day in 2013 an electric guitar played by Bob Dylan at the 1965 Newport Folk Festival made USD 965,000 at auction. In those days playing an electric guitar at a folk festival would have been derided by acoustic purists, but for the finder of that Fender Stratocaster that Dylan left on a plane, the auction was a windfall 48 years later.
EUR/USD 1.0790.
Mama, take this badge off of me
I can’t use it anymore
It’s gettin’ dark, too dark to see
I feel I’m knockin’ on heaven’s door
Knock, knock, knockin’ on heaven’s door
Knock, knock, knockin’ on heaven’s door
Knock, knock, knockin’ on heaven’s door
Knock, knock, knockin’ on heaven’s door
Mama, put my guns in the ground
I can’t shoot them anymore
That long black cloud is comin’ down
I feel I’m knockin’ on heaven’s door
Knock, knock, knockin’ on heaven’s door
Knock, knock, knockin’ on heaven’s door
Knock, knock, knockin’ on heaven’s door
Knock, knock, knockin’ on heaven’s door
Discussion and Analysis by Humphrey Percy, Chairman and Founder
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