Sunday, 2 January 2011

Predictions 2011


Predications. Must try harder to make accurate ones. Did well on 'chocolate finger' and Ocado though. You did all stay clear of them, yes?

1. Inflation just won't go away. It will continue to rise, despite the politicians predictions, and will go well over 4% before ending the year at around 3.25%, still above target but the target is a fantasy one anyway..


2. Inflation will force up rates. They go up slowly initially as the recovery is precarious but then faster as they must. Despite the most hawkish calling for 4-5% rates in 2011 they won't manage more than 2.25%, but the trend is always up.

3.The USA finally begins to crawl out of recession. Decent retail and manufacturing numbers leave Europe wondering how they manage to do it. The exception being Germany , who continues to grow steadily, despite another Euro crisis.

4. Even with all the strains of Euro states and banks debt refinancing, defaulting Spain and crumbling Italy no-one can figure out a way to get out of the Euro, so its stitched together with compromise, after compromise after bailout..and just survives 2011.


5. Politics: All the leaders survive. Coalition settles down, despite MPs repeatedly being caught in media stings. In the end, the public reckon they have enough problems of their own, without worrying about who's bitching about whom. David Laws makes it back which gladdens the Tories hearts, as he gets more air time than foot-in-mouth Cable.
Constant U-turns seriously undermines the governments credibility by the end of 2011 however, as they cave in too quickly and too often on politically sensitive cuts.
Still, plenty of strikes and mob rampages though..

4 comments:

measured said...

1. Agree. Inflation is clever taxation. At least it reduces the deficit.

2. Interest rates will 'double', but with struggling companies and bad debt levels rising, not by too much.

4. Yup, the US continues to print dollars and get away with it. No chickens roosting there.

3. There will be discussions for a country to leave the Euro, although German would prefer seizing fiscal control over the PIIGS economies. Nervous headaches. Tensions
rise.

4. Cameron and Clegg come out as a united front. Cameron reveals his real colours on matters that really count, unlike Bookstart, and displays his backbone. Civil unrest rises.

5. January will be grim (job losses/sovereign debt), February will be grim (more snow), March will be grim (no jobs), April (royal wedding!), May (a Budget hangover) ... a year to split the weak from the strong. Alcohol sales will rise.

Hunker down, BQ.

Anonymous said...

1) Yep, cash is trash. The elite must be delighted that the useful fools of the Fourth Estate have been prattling on about deflation while they loaded up on NS& index-linked etc. then whisked away from the 'little people' they despise.

2) Rates will be juggled to allow bank(s/ers) to make a fortune on the differential between savers and borrowers. Firstly to accelerate the chances of selling the part-nationalised banks, secondly another banking bailout would have the middle classes rioting

3) Everything Euro will be fudged and fiddled until, as with Soviet tractor production figures, it become obvious to all that it's a sham. Maybe not in 2011 though.

4) The reality of post peak-oil/peak-food starts to hit home and affects every aspect of life in Britain

5) Stagflation return to Britain and the Condem government gets in a bigger muddle than Ted Heath's

Thud said...

I expect it to be quite a decent year complete with the sky staying exactly where it should.

James Higham said...

Well, in your game, Thud, I'd imagine it would be like that.