Matt

Ok, so the clubs who make the most money can spend it (so the teams qualifying for the CL). Other sides cannot match them as they are no allowed to spend above their turnover- which is the situation which lead to Lyon's long period of dominance in France. It makes it even easier for existing big boys to cement their position at the top. Better alternatives would be to cap additional investment as a percentage of turnover, or a club licencing system. Football club companies would own a non-transferrable licence and that company is limited in the levels of debt it may undertake. Additional debt beyond this level can only be injected by way of issuing debt at a holding company and subscribing to ordinary shares in the club. The FA should be able to retain step-in rights of licensed clubs in the event that the company finances are not in order.

Banks fund themselves well over base-rate, base-rate is only what the BoE will lend to banks on an overnight basis when secured (typically on UK Gov Debt). You have to consider longer term funding at something like 5% for example.

No it was their massive over-reliance on short-term wholesale funding. When that dried up, the doors closed. Businesses are complaining about the cost of borrowing- but long-term funds are more expensive than short-term and as banks shift themselves onto far more stable funding platforms, the cost of lending that money increases.

Everyone knows that a large state crowds out private sector investment. Unless of course that private sector was never there in the first place, in which case it all goes tits up. The Tories are going to have to do something seismic to encourage small businesses. Basel 3 is going to hammer SME lending. The loan markets are free flowing if you're a large corporate, not so for the smaller players. And you can't expect lending to increase when a global standard is coming in that will make lending significantly more expensive. It will pummel non-drawn facilities such as working capital lines which are treated the same as fully drawn loans. You can't force banks to make rash lending decisions- in fact its extremely dangerous. There is supposedly new regulations about 'moral hazard'- forcing to lend gives everyone an excuse if a deal hits the skids- "It's not my fault, the government told me to lend it". Banks cant take more risk and less risk at the same time. Small businesses are inherently risky. The prevailing market is such that a lot of SME lending is pseudo-equity and the government should be looking at this avenue as the best funding route- already some of the larger banks have effectively created a venture capital fund which I think will fill the gap between what banks can afford to lend and what businesses can afford to borrow.

That was bad on x30, never mind live.

Boom. Lualua scores a cracker. 1-0 brighton.

You can when you've had to extend your debt time and time again just to stay afloat.

Wasn't Barry Horne was one of those sent off, Earl Barratt the other.

Johnnie and Douggie sacked Robson. Freddie did as he was told to keep his plum job.

Anyone can claim FITs. But if the govt want us to all to produce renewable energy, then there is an up-front cost that has to be met. That can be public, private, charity, individual, whoever. I'm aware of that, but rather than enabling and assisting the public to procure their own the tories are promoting the private sector directly on government websites offering free solar panels, lowering energy bills slightly and 100% of the feed in tariffs going to their mates companies. Stinks imo. I dislike Tories as much as the next man, but the whole scheme went live in April and was a Labour-era project. I don't think it's as bad as you are making out- the current return is a bit of a 'sweetener' to get as many companies as possible putting in renewable sources sooner rather than later- thereby reducing the overall burden on UK power stations (albeit marginally), with a number of coal-fired stations scheduled to go offline 2012-2020 and not much to replace them. The tariff drops over time as the technology is expected to get cheaper.

Anyone can claim FITs. But if the govt want us to all to produce renewable energy, then there is an up-front cost that has to be met. That can be public, private, charity, individual, whoever.

Well that proves he does have a working apostophe function.

You need a better TV. And I'd expect London to be well up there due to the ease of after-work drinking due to the fact its impossible to travel to work by car pretty much anywhere, although when I was working in town I did park my car overnight in Grey St once or twice.

Still not as many clubs as Stuart Elliott.

If Keane left on loan and had an iffy season, he'd be struggling to find takers. Right now he could probably score a 4-year contract on decent terms. Things could well change on this just before the deadline.

Smack his hoe

Saturday 12pm, on SSN.

http://sexyalevels.tumblr.com/

Look ahead six months. If you're being dumped on repeatedly in order to get your idiot boss out of the shit, then you need to pick your moment to make your point. If you have an upcoming holiday for example, there's no point kicking up a fuss now when in a few weeks he'll be fucked anyway because you're not in the office. You will have shown your value by your absence. There's no point in tolerating this for any lengthy period, at least not without making others aware of what you are doing, by the sounds of it he'll be out on his arse in 6 months and any brownie points you might think you have earned will vanish into thin air. Equally any promises he makes you regarding pay are equally worthless as he probably won't be around to see them through. Most worryingly is that repeatedly poor managers being put in place suggests those above them are no better. Don't bother getting HR involved. They will attempt to draw a diagram or ask you to write your feelings down on post-it notes and put it on some kind of emotional axis.

Way too easy.

Sonia tbh.

Kitman- that's exactly what I mean. Take something vanilla such as fixed-floating rate swap. You've locked in a rate, now you have to post collateral as well, pushing up all-in funding costs. I'm not sure what will happen to existing books. Also you need to take into account propreitary technology in more complex trades. Those hedging options will no longer exist because the system will show the whole world how its done soon as its posted. Some companies already do post but they are usually of dubious creditworthiness and they scream and twist if you try to put one in place. This isn't hammering banks, it's hammering hedging as a whole which is a step too far. Of course the UK may decide that they don't want to follow suit and all the banks move their core swap operations to London.

The Volcker rule on derivtives trades is retarded. It will effectively mean that someone looking to hedge a rate for say, a year. will need to find the cash to post collateral against the mark-to-market if the trade turns against them. It's not just banks against this- it defeats the whole object od hedging. Some very poorly thought out legislation that if anything, favour speculators over hedgers.

Growth in the last few years was artificially boosted by a cheap debt bubble. The Government did not adequately prepare for the possibility of a downturn by not saving for a rainy day in the good times. Public sector/consumer spending have also contributed to this unnatural growth of the economy. The private sector had begun to faulter well before the credit crisis. Huge levels of bad debt started this crisis in the first place None of the above can be disputed. I think the mispricing of risk is the real underlier. Risky investments are fine with a price tag to match, what toppled the debt mountain was the sale of junk as investment-grade products, not to mention crap regulation by Brown et al while trousering phenomenal amounts of corporation tax.