Morning Brief – Turkey: Short and Caught?

Turkey: Short and Caught?

Being short of Turkish Lira will cost 1050% to borrow overnight in the offshore market as the local market has been drained following heavy state intervention executed through the state banks in the past week-probably more than $2.5 Billion taking the state $ sales to over $65 Billion. That Lira defence has meant that short sellers of the currency have to deliver and hence the squeeze. The fight to keep the TRL below the psychological level of 7 to USD has been a very costly exercise and cannot yet be judged a success.

Hugo Boss

A single swallow does not make a summer but encouraging that German fashion house Hugo Boss is expecting demand for suits and formal wear to return as soon as the current Covid lockdown ceases, after sales fell 59% in Q2. Their shares are down 47% this year but have remained steady with the announcement that quarterly revenues were at EUR 275 Million and the operating loss of EUR 124 Million was not as bad as expected. Hugo Ferdinand Boss was born in 1895 and founded his company in 1923. Hugo Boss had form at anticipating trends in formal wear as in the 1930’s he supplied uniforms to the SS, the SA, Hitler Youth and the Wehrmacht. After the war he was found to be an activist, supporter and beneficiary of National Socialism, but having successfully appealed, this was downgraded to being a follower despite him being an early adopter having joined the Nazi Party in 1931. The company was subsequently run by his son in law Eugen Holly as Hugo Boss was banned from both owning and also the management of any company; somewhat bizarrely, in 1948 Hugo Boss succumbed to an abscess of a tooth and died. Hugo Boss AG has in the past 75 years gone from strength to strength and as a leading global fashion brand has fully overcome that earlier period in its history.

Isle of Wight Festival: 1970

50 years ago in August 1970 the last in a series of 3 annual music festivals took place on the Isle of Wight. Better attended than Woodstock, 600,000-700,000 fans flocked to the Western side of the IoW. Hendrix, The Doors, Moody Blues, Who, Miles Davis, Joan Baez, Joni Mitchell, ELP, Free, Sly and the Family Stone and Ten Years After were included in the line-up. Financially it was a conspicuous failure as once the numbers became apparent, ticketing went out of the window and the organisers had no choice but to announce it was a free festival. Organisationally it was badly received with technical failures that drove the over refreshed crowd wild. Beer cans and much worse were hurled at performers, tents and concessions were set on fire and the 100,000 residents of IoW were so traumatised that it was not for a further 32 years in 2002 that a licence was granted to hold a music festival. The Moody Blues did manage to calm things a little with this 1967 classic which was number 10 out of 16 on their set list that memorable night on 30-08-70:

Nights in White Satin:

Nights in white satin
Never reaching the end
Letters I’ve written
Never meaning to send

Beauty I’ve always missed
With these eyes before
Just what the truth is
I can’t say any more

‘Cause I love you
Yes I love you
oh oh oh I love you

Gazing at people
Some hand in hand
Just what I’m going through
They can understand

Some try to tell me
Thoughts they cannot defend
Just what you want to be
You will be in the end

And I love you

Discussion and Analysis by Humphrey Percy, Chairman and Founder

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