For the first time in over 3 months the two sides reconvened yesterday for the oldest reason in the world: self-interest. Make no mistake these trade disagreements are costing real money to both sides: Huawei is hurting following the US banning American firms from using their technology; US agriculture is hurting due to Chinese import tariffs and lastly…both sides are hurting as the trade dispute is weighing on global confidence and growth. No better reason to find a way through all this for both sides: money.
Gold Silver ratio and the (very) long view
We last wrote about this three weeks ago when the gold to silver ratio was 92 times and we expressed doubt about how much higher it could go. It is now back to 86 times and the gold price is firm while good news for the silver bulls among you is that silver has risen a whole dollar to $16. Spare a thought for 70 year old Robert Vesmerais who has spent the last 22 years prospecting for silver and dreaming of a big strike as the sole inhabitant of a Californian ghost town named Cerro Gordo or Fat Hill in Spanish and he claims(no pun) to have found a wheelbarrow full of silver in that time. Frankly he would have been better off sticking to his previous career as a school teacher. Still there is at least no light pollution and plenty of tumbleweed.
No this is not what the young guns at sgm-fx go on on a Thursday night, it’s what PM Mateusz Morawiecki is doing about arresting the flight of Poland’s youth overseas: at a stroke he has announced the removal of the 18% income tax for anyone under 26 earning less than the Zloty equivalent of EUR 20K which is a decent incentive as the average wage in Poland is EUR 14K.
Ear Ear-WHAT? Silly Season Story
No this is not a tale about deafness. Trying to type this with a straight face- apparently tickling the ear with a small electric current can help the over 55s age more healthily and therefore more slowly. The vagus nerve is connected to the heart, lungs and gut which means that tickling it will improve body, sleep and mood according to a research team at the University of Leeds. The vagus nerve is also known as the wandering nerve because it is long and well connected and “it transmits information from the brain to organs around the body.”
We are trying to find one of these nerves for SGM-FX’s James on Amazon (they seem to have everything) as it will surely connect him to the rest of us! WHAT?!
Discussion and Analysis by Humphrey Percy, Chairman and Founder
EU Border Controls 26,000 respondents in 18 jurisdictions have spoken and 51% of them are dissatisfied with border controls and the level of immigration into the EU. Now that is a statistic that political parties across the EU should sit up and take notice of in the next two months in the lead up to […]
UK Trade Deals While there have been deals signed with Australia in 2021 and New Zealand in 2022, the past post Brexit years in respect of trade deals have been more about which deals have not been agreed that should have been rather than those that did get signed: Canada due to the UK refusing […]
Bank of England As expected UK interest rates were left unchanged following the Monetary Policy Committee’s meeting this week. The message is clear that the Old Lady will not be rushed into making hasty interest rate reduction decisions,and, given that inflation is still at 3.4%, the market sold GBP immediately after the announcement yesterday lunch […]