Where to invest money in a crisis

Computer_Beginner

Depends on the crisis?
Shares outside the UK are unlikely to protect you from a global stock crash (eg 2007-8).

My option would be a mixture of precious metals and defensive stocks (eg large cap pharma, utilities, consumer essentials etc).

Others would opt for bonds, but I'm not so keen.
The govt has learnt that ZIRP and QE is an easy way out of a crisis. It worked (for them) last time, so why would they not try it next time?
Do you really want to be guaranteed an income in fiat terms, when the QE starts up again?

Glen_Clark

Filo25 wrote: »

I honestly couldn't care less what the tabloids have to say about Corbyn, my concern is more that I don't think Corbyn has ever found an economic issue for which his answer wasn't tax more and spend more, along with more state and union involvement that is unlikely to be a positive backdrop for UK company earnings

How is spending more not positive for company earnings?
Spending on infrastructure and social housing sounds positive for company earnings.
As is giving a bigger slice of the cake to the less well off because they tend to spend it straightaway and in the UK - rather than villas in Tuscany etc
Depends where he gets the tax from of course.
If he succeeds in getting it from the 'newspaper' owners tax havens it could be more positive for the UK economy than the Tories Trickle Down economics?

Computer_Beginner

Glen_Clark wrote: »

How is spending more not positive for company earnings?
Spending on infrastructure and social housing sounds positive for company earnings.
As is giving a bigger slice of the cake to the less well off because they tend to spend it straightaway and in the UK - rather than villas in Tuscany etc
Depends where he gets the tax from of course.
If he succeeds in getting it from the 'newspaper' owners tax havens it could be more positive for the UK economy than the Tories Trickle Down economics?

Very true.
But unfortunately, so many of the British public are completely taken in by the government and mainstream media propaganda.

If the government built 20 million council houses next year and virtually guaranteed everyone a free (or very low rent) home for life, UK productivity would increase massively.

Why?

1. Companies could pay lower wages, offer flexible working and take more risks - because the workers would have more disposable income and home security etc.
2. All the money currently locked up in unproductive house price "equity" would be released to be spent on more productive parts of the economy. Workers could buy shares, goods etc.
3. Individuals could take more risks setting up businesses etc. Because they wouldn't have to worry about their homes being seized if they went bankrupt.

Voyager2002

worried_jim wrote: »

I moved all of my investments out of the U.K. straight after the Brexit vote (wish I'd done it the day before, never in my wildest dreams....) and doing all right so far. I have a review every November and will probably leave alone this year, may see what the landscape looks like Nov 2019, but with the added threat of Corbyn I don't think the U.K. will be seeing a return of my hard earned savings for a while. Sadly.

I moved all mine out of the UK before the Brexit vote, but did a little buying during the panic immediately afterwards. All my money will come home if Corbyn becomes prime minister.

Computer_Beginner

Voyager2002 wrote: »

I

All my money will come home if Corbyn becomes prime minister.

What do you mean?

Iain_For

My approach to Brexit has been to increase the cash proportion of my already globally diversified portfolio as I will retire a month after the official leave date and need a healthy cushion to mitigate sequence of return risk. Was fortunate enough to put a sizeable sum in NS&I Growth Bonds at 2.2% before they were withdrawn.

Politically, I don’t see the uncertainty subsiding. The Leave vote, we are told, reflected the view of an alienated section of a divided society who had nothing to lose. The Brexit process has further alienated much of the middle ground who voted Remain and who now feel the main two parties don’t represent them and has further polarised and divided Britain (to say nothing of what it is doing to the Tory party). Brexit is not the solution to these divisions as it will not address any of the causes of that division. Quite a legacy we’re leaving our kids to sort out.

atush

pearl123 wrote: »

There would be no Brexit if it hadn’t been for Cameron’s ego.

Absurd. He didnt want a referendum, but had to offer one as an election promise. So had to call for one.

Wish he had spoken to someone who wass in market research as the question/s asked often determine the answer. So could have been a better question being asked.

Computer_Beginner

Iain_For wrote: »

The Leave vote, we are told, reflected the view of an alienated section of a divided society who had nothing to lose. .

That's how the MSM initially portrayed it, the northern working classes unhappy with low wages etc.
It's now been shown that the leave vote was pushed over the line by the middle classes in Middle England and the SE of England (Think nostaglia for the 1950s, bunting on the village green, fans of Jacob Rees-Mogg etc.)

Those northern working class who did vote, were more likely to vote leave. (The MSM got that bit correct). But in numerical terms, the Middle England leave voters were more likely to actually vote.

That's according to Danny Dorling, Oxford Geography Prof.

I think the 'Young Remainers / Older Leavers' stereotype did actually turn out to be correct.
Which is interesting, because if those people stick to their views, Brexit is more likely to be reversed in any future referendum.

The whole thing has very little logic to it, because if the concern is about increased immigration of workers pushing wages down and house prices up, the Middle England voters were voting against their vested interests.

GreatApe

Computer_Beginner wrote: »

Very true.
But unfortunately, so many of the British public are completely taken in by the government and mainstream media propaganda.

If the government built 20 million council houses next year and virtually guaranteed everyone a free (or very low rent) home for life, UK productivity would increase massively.

Why?

1. Companies could pay lower wages, offer flexible working and take more risks - because the workers would have more disposable income and home security etc.
2. All the money currently locked up in unproductive house price "equity" would be released to be spent on more productive parts of the economy. Workers could buy shares, goods etc.
3. Individuals could take more risks setting up businesses etc. Because they wouldn't have to worry about their homes being seized if they went bankrupt.

1: No they couldn't the only way companies could pay lower wages is if capital took a larger percentage of GDP relative to labor that is something you dont want to happen

2: There is no 'money' locked up in homes. And if you built 20 million homes homes would cost virtually nothing so the 'capital' that is 'locked up' in homes would be worthless

3: We dont need more individuals 'taking risks' we already have plenty of fools destroying good capital with bad business ideas that fail


4: There is no way to build 20 million homes in one single year. Even if you closed down the NHS and all the suppliers to the NHS and somehow magically trained them all to be builders in just 1 day still these 3 million workers would not be sufficient to build 20 million homes in 12 months. Let us take a more realistic example of building 1 million homes a year that would require you to find around 5 million builders/plumbers/brickies etc we do not have that much idle capacity so even 1/20th of your idea wont work even if you were king and the rest of us were your slaves it wouldn't be possible to build just 1 million homes next year

Like many on the left your grand ideas are foolish because they do not stand up to reality and just show you up to be at a child level of understanding

GreatApe

Glen_Clark wrote: »

How is spending more not positive for company earnings?
Spending on infrastructure and social housing sounds positive for company earnings.
As is giving a bigger slice of the cake to the less well off because they tend to spend it straightaway and in the UK - rather than villas in Tuscany etc
Depends where he gets the tax from of course.
If he succeeds in getting it from the 'newspaper' owners tax havens it could be more positive for the UK economy than the Tories Trickle Down economics?

Money confuses people needlessly

Take money out of the question and think of the UK economy as a colony of ants a colony about 33 million workers strong. This colony needs to produce all the goods and services it needs plus it needs to look after the other 33 million who are kids/elderly/disabled etc

So people who think 'spending more' will just produce more how does it work in ant terms?
What do you mean by 'spending more'?

Because in reality you have 33 million ants. You can not magic more up
These ants already have work to do, like farmings ants, nhs ants, fire service ants, train driver ants, postal delivery ants, food processing ants, teacher ants, defense ants and everything else

On the right you hear that we need to be more productive. That means these 33 million ants need to get better at doing what it is they do. So if we have 3 million nhs ants they need to be more productive so say 2.8 million ants can run the NHS that you you have 0.2 million NHS ants freed up to produce different goods and services

People on the left like you seem to say spend more.....well what the hell does that mean?
Lets say you 'spend more' well you still only have 33 million ants how can you produce more by 'spend more'?

As for more 'infrastructure' spending it is mostly wasted eg like HS2 is going to be a nice big wasteful black hole.

And with regards to council homes, you do realize the government isnt going to retain teachers or bus drivers or MPs to lay brick? If there is a council home building program the government is just going to tender out contracts and so who is going to build these council homes? Well it is going to be the private sector so in reality the only difference between a council home or a private home is going to be the badge

The homes will be built by the same bricks from the same factories using the same men only the title is different. In which case why wait there are already a million homes up for sale this moment, the government could just buy a million homes and decree them 'council homes' and job done and dusted over a 2 month period. But put like that it is clear there is no advantage to council housing

If anything the opposite should happen, the 5 million existing council homes should be gifted for free to the existing tenants. Straight away ownership would jump by 5 million and youd help the poorest in society