China’s monetary policy will be more flexible and its fiscal policy more proactive in H2 2020. While a long way from embracing Western human rights values as we know, China is demonstrating that its economic approach is completely different today to how it was when the First 5 year Plan focussing on rapid industrial development was decided on in 1953; this gave way to the Second 5 year Plan in 1958 when the focus under the Great Leap Forward was on agricultural communes and smaller industrial enterprises. In other words when China used to set a course and a 5 year Plan, that was it-no deviation at all. Looking at the direction of 5 year USD versus CNY graph, the 12% CNY devaluation to where it stands today at 7.00 has certainly not been a straight line and reflects China’s efforts to establish the credentials of the CNY as a major global currency.
It is anecdotal, but the UK Chancellor lifting Stamp Duty Land Tax to kick in at GBP 500,000 is injecting life into the moribund UK residential property market- in London at least. SGM-FX Operations Officer Jisun has been up with the lark over the past few weekends to join long viewing queues for houses in North East London. Jisun and her husband have encountered that old chestnut of agents informing them that only offers at or above the asking price will be countenanced. However their persistence has finally paid off and they have managed to beat off other hopefuls and snag the house that they wanted at below the asking price.
British Airways mailed yesterday to advise me that in the past 28 years I have flown more than 6 times the distance from the Earth to the Moon with them. Right now long distance and regular air travel is looking to be a long way away from making a comeback, but just to motivate their customers, BA is offering double Avios. In recent years I have also regularly patronised both Singapore Airlines and Virgin Atlantic to Asia and North America respectively so my total is well over 2 million miles but still close to home against the 34 million miles between Earth and Mars. The question was certainly on David Bowie’s mind in 1971 with this classic from Ziggy Stardust:
Life on Mars
It’s a God-awful small affair
To the girl with the mousy hair
But her mummy is yelling “No”
And her daddy has told her to go
But her friend is nowhere to be seen
Now she walks through her sunken dream
To the seat with the clearest view
And she’s hooked to the silver screen
But the film is a saddening bore
For she’s lived it ten times or more
She could spit in the eyes of fools
As they ask her to focus on
Sailors fighting in the dance hall
Oh man! Look at those cavemen go
It’s the freakiest show
Take a look at the lawman
Beating up the wrong guy
Oh man, wonder if he’ll ever know
He’s in the best selling show
Is there life on Mars?
Discussion and Analysis by Humphrey Percy, Chairman and Founder
Strong USD Those punitive tariff threats – Copper 50%, Brazil 50% and Pharmaceuticals 200% had a marked effect on USD. Bizarrely, while POTUS has been conducting his self-harming measures on the USA and the USD, he sees no contradiction in maintaining that he sees USD remaining the primary world reserve currency. A total of 22 […]
Australia Falling inflation, sluggish economic growth, a strong currency, lower living standards and low productivity would normally easily add up to an interest rate cut by the central bank: not in Australia where it was widely expected that yesterday would indeed see a rate cut. That is because the Reserve Bank of Australia is worried […]
Poland June 2025 will go down as a milestone for the energy sector in Poland as it was the first month that renewable energy overtook fossil fuels as a proportion of Poland’s total energy requirements. Poland is one of the highest emitting countries only behind China, Kuwait, South Africa, and Kazakhstan and despite coal consumption […]