BEWARE! THE BANKS ARE OUT TO GET YOU!

[Tripps]

Disturbing news in recent days,

1.Microsoft have paid billions for a share and seat on the board of the London Stock Exchange.
2. The Bank of England are going to trial a digital currency.
3. Block chain trialled to replace the traditional trading methods on the LSE, and the gold market Gold

No links I'm afraid, and apologies since this post is all over the place - but there'll be more to come.

Can you see where all this is going? The steam is running out of IT so Mr Gates is looking for the next big opportunity. He's the devil incarnate to some people - and I am beginning to see why. Boris has spotted the opportunity, (speech in Singapore that he rushed home from to not be PM) and I'd wouldn't be surprised if Tony Blair had not been there behind the scenes, for some time.

[plaques]

On the other hand they could use PayPal via WhatsApp. They appear to use it for all other government business.

[Stanley]

The latest inflation figures show an annual rate of 10.7 which is slightly lower than expected, 10.9 was forecast. However the economists forecast that the BofE will raise the base rate by half a percentage point thus increasing the repayments on the average tracker mortgage by £50 a month.
Also the resolution Foundation estimates that the effective inflation rate for the lowest earners is 12.1% because of the range of goods they spend their money on.
Whichever way it is spun, it is still the highest inflation for forty years.

[Stanley]

I suppose this weekend will see the start of the annual Xmas shopping frenzy. Include me out. Every supermarket should have a mandatory notice pointing out that people don't need m,or food at Xmas and come January all the credit card bills will be rolling in.
I know I am a spoilsport mentioning this but there will be some very regretful people in the New Year.

[Tizer]

Elon Musk has been banning some journalists from Twitter. I'll bet he's throwing his toys out of the pram because he's just found out he's no longer the world's richest man! The boss of luxury goods business LVMH has taken the lead. Musk has lost a lot due to a fall in the Tesla share price.

[Tripps]

File under "What could possibly go wrong"

Binance's auditors have scrubbed a report into the financial health of the company from the internet and dropped the cryptocurrency giant as a client. The price of bitcoin fell as much as 2pc this morning following reports. A website featuring a "proof of reserves" report, produced by French audit firm Mazars, which showed how much financial collateral Binance held, had been deleted this morning.
A Binance spokesman said Mazars, which previously audited the accounts of former US President Donald Trump, had "temporarily" paused work with digital currency companies.

Donald Trump boasted he was "better" than Abraham Lincoln on Thursday as he unveiled a set of NFT (Non Fungible Tokens) digital trading cards featuring him as a superhero, an astronaut and a cowboy.

[Stanley]

How often have we argued that this fantasy world of finance, NFTs and Bitcoin is fundamentally flawed in that there is actually no substance of value. The billionaires laugh at saps like us as they order their yachts but their fall from grace is spectacular and at least one, the billionaire who ran Ftx is in gaol on remand. Who will be proved right in the long run?The idle buggers with bright ideas or the boring old farts like us.....?

[Tizer]

Donald Trump ..... unveiled a set of NFT (Non Fungible Tokens) digital trading cards featuring him as a superhero, an astronaut and a cowboy.

As shown here: Trump NFT card example He's selling them at $99 each.

[Tripps]

He's selling them at $99 each.

Yes - I realised that later that I was talking about the thing you had already posted. I read that he has sold out and made $4.4 million.

American stupidity I might try it. . . .

[Big Kev]

Not out to get me this time but something useful, the Natwest banking app has been updated and I was able to pay in a cheque first time. I have used it before but it took several attempts to get an acceptable image.

[Tizer]

We knew something like this would happen but the financial whizz kids out there don't use their brains, they let greed lead them. Now, isn't there a German word for this? It's worth reading the article and then enjoying the warm glow of knowing that you had more sense than to buy cryptocurrency.
`Singapore's crypto ambitions shaken by FTX collapse' LINK

[Tripps]

I'm sure there is a suitable word somewhere, but It doesn't readily come to mind. Actually I now prefer the French 'Joie maligne'.

These are the sort of people who paid a vast fee to Boris for a speech. recently. Maybe he'll donate it back to them?

What is it about ex PMs? Cameron having failed to get into the extended payments racket is now doing a ' Learn Yourself Politics 'course in the Gulf - or wherever Skype permits him to be. Those that can - do : those that can't - teach.

[Tizer]

Actually I now prefer the French 'Joie maligne'.

Lovely! I'll try to remember that by associating it in my mind with a tin of Germolene.

[Stanley]

Does anyone remember Our Ernie, "Mrs Entwhistle's Little Lad"? He was a character created for Knock-Out by C. E. Holt in 1939. The strip was set in Wigan and inspired by Albert Ramsbottom, the naughty boy of Stanley Holloway's monologues. After getting up to mischief, Ernie would return home with the catchphrase "What's for tea, Ma?", to which his Pa would reply "Daft, I call it!"
That was a long winded explanation of why the first thing that enters my head when I see mention of crypto currency and Non Fungible scams Ernie's dad comes to mind. "Daft I call it" covers it.
Anyone who pays out hard cash for something that doesn't exist is obviously balanced on a knife edge of sanity and I have no sympathy at all when they fall off.
Why is it left to the US to do the obvious thing and arrest the promoters? Why don't we do the same in London, the so called financial capital of the World....?

[Tizer]

That's what the banks want to happen so that they can set up their own crypto money.

[Stanley]

But I still don't understand why people hand over hard cash in exchange for nothing tangible. Is this the sort of thinking that sees Quantitative Easing as a viable way to solve a shortage of hard cash?
Sorry, but there is something very wrong about this.

[plaques]

A 20 minute YouTube on Sam Bankman-Fried FTX. Gives some background of the company where it appears to have handed access of its funds to another of his 'Investment' company where the money which never existed vanished into thin air leaving those who had invested their money in nothing with nothing to show for it. Meanwhile the real money which had bought nothing was further invested until it was all gone. Are you following me?

No wonder the banks want to get into the act of selling 'pretend' money and charging administration fees for doing so.

[Stanley]

The dreadful fact is that far fetched as your account sounds, as far as I can see it is roughly what happened. As you say, perfect ground rules for the Lords of the Universe. I still remember Janet telling me about the attitude of her managers at a big merchant bank when she warned them about the algorithms controlling the 'in thing' at the time, 'negotiable instruments' and the only question they had was "Will it make a profit"? That's the attitude that gives us Non Fungible Tokens. Include me out! (At that time it led to the 2008 credit crunch.)

[Tripps]

I had to phone the bank today - the little code generating gadget has got a flat battery.

Standing by with a page full of user name, passwords, favourite holiday, distant relative's first name, pins etc. They just asked me for my post code and name - then did the business. I queried this and was told - Oh it's OK we know it's you just from hearing your voice. - we can analyze it and that's all we need.

I think that's progress - I'm fairly sure, mercifully, there aren't two voices that sound like me.

[Big Kev]

The technology has progressed in my banking app too, I use the full biometric offering on it now. Fingerprint to open it and facial recognition to authorise any one off payments. Occasionally it prompts me for a password which calls for some serious thinking on which one I used when I set it up

[Stanley]

If Firefox can't remember my passwords I only have one tiny fig leaf between me supplying one and asking for a new one!

[Tizer]

I queried this and was told - Oh it's OK we know it's you just from hearing your voice. - we can analyze it and that's all we need.

Are you by any chance banking with HSBC? Their boys in China probably have a lot of experience in that sort of thing!

[Stanley]

See THIS BBC report on the fine imposed on TSB as a consequence of their IT failure 4 years ago. All told, skimping on investment into the IT change has cost the bank over £400miilion. In other words that's what the investors and customers have lost.
Why has it taken 4 years to allocate blame?

[Stanley]

See THIS for the latest view of GDP growth in November 2022 from the Office for National Statistics.
"Monthly real gross domestic product (GDP) is estimated to have grown by 0.1% in November 2022, following growth of 0.5% (unrevised from our previous publication) in October 2022. Looking at the broader picture, GDP fell by 0.3% in the three months to November 2022." (The burst of activity in November is put down to the World Cup)
I think those of us who said we were in recession before Xmas might have been right. Good luck lads.

[plaques]

People resorting to using virtual money to buy things for Christmas. Credit card debt and deferred loans has sored to a point that a lot of charities are reporting that it could take years to pay off the debt with some people reporting that they may not be able to pay at all. I suspect that the debt is not confined to Christmas presents but is a sign of the times of making ends meet. It may be easy to say don't use credit cards but the alternative may be a standard of living that drops way below the poverty line.