Capitalists@Work

As argued here several times, governments are deeply ill-advised to set "legally binding targets" for Net Zero policies.  Well, LBTs for almost anything actually; because somebody litigious will...

http://www.cityunslicker.co.uk/2024/04/net-zero-contradictions-snpgreen.html

Yesterday I met a senior DESNZ type who was a bit miffed that there'd been very little coverage of this announcement from January -   > UK INVESTS IN HIGH-TECH NUCLEAR FUEL TO PUSH ...

http://www.cityunslicker.co.uk/2024/04/nuclear-fuel-important-dvevelopment.html

It's been a very long time since we last ran a thread on gold - it seems to be this one from 2015 , when CU wrote: GOLD HITS A FIVE YEAR LOW; A POSITIVE MESSAGE? Well, turned out 2015 was no...

http://www.cityunslicker.co.uk/2024/04/gold-very-traditional-debating-point.html

Prisoners of Geography (Tim Marshall) is a well known, oft-quoted book on geopolitics.  It's really an A-level text - first-year university stuff at best.  I don't have a copy to hand.  But t...

http://www.cityunslicker.co.uk/2024/04/iran-israel-george-bush-snrs-1991.html

Here's a very odd story , that we must surely assume comes from Lloyds itself.  > LLOYDS CUTS RISK MANAGEMENT ROLES IN BID TO ‘MOVE AT GREATER > PACE’  > BANK’S RISK ASS...

http://www.cityunslicker.co.uk/2024/04/why-would-lloyds-boast-about-culling.html

UNLOVED - IN SOME QUARTERS ... Shell seems to be putting it about that it might leave the LSE for a New York listing .  Well, it's already listed in NY and has been for many years.  Obviou...

http://www.cityunslicker.co.uk/2024/04/shell-to-quit-london-stock-exchange.html

The other day I was asked by a good friend and ex colleague whether, by some remote chance, I'd kept a copy of a report we'd written - 20 years ago ... Well, he stood a chance as I've always be...

http://www.cityunslicker.co.uk/2024/04/the-lies-that-businessmen-tell.html

Over at Sacker's blog, there's an interesting Good Friday post from 'JD': a religious procession in the Spanish town of Avilés, taking place to a somewhat syncopated drumbeat.  Somewhat disconc...

http://www.cityunslicker.co.uk/2024/03/happy-easter-some-music.html

So we have an outcome on yet another of our 2024 predictions compo items: SB-F's sentence & fine .  The jail term is clear enough, the fine less so: he must "forfeit $11bn in assets".  Is that...

http://www.cityunslicker.co.uk/2024/03/2024-predictions-compo-bankman-fried.html

In times gone by Germany as a whole, and most German businessmen I have met, liked to come across as the grown-ups of Europe.  Oh, their worldly wisdom!  How I remember the condescending post-B...

http://www.cityunslicker.co.uk/2024/03/aspects-of-russias-war-on-ukraine-3.html

By, er, popular demand :  a short account of the recent refurbishment of Sidney Cotton's legendary Lockheed Electra 12a, UK registration G-AFTL.  For more on why it's a legend , see these earli...

http://www.cityunslicker.co.uk/2024/03/the-refurbishment-of-sidney-cottons-g.html

Having considered developments on the land , we now turn to the air.  Many months ago there was a period of serious debate around whether Russia was going to go down the tactical nuclear route.�...

http://www.cityunslicker.co.uk/2024/03/aspects-of-russias-war-on-ukraine-part.html

A couple of years ago I ran a couple of posts on the piratical old rogue Sidney Cotton and his WW2 exploits in the famous Lockheed G-AFTL; and how it was returning to the UK to be refurbished ....

http://www.cityunslicker.co.uk/2024/03/sidney-cottons-pirate-war-revisited.html

What has Hunt achieved?  A bit of stealing Labour's thunder?  A bit of tinkering?  The last budget by a Tory chancellor for a decade? Well I never pretended to understand macroeconomics.  O...

http://www.cityunslicker.co.uk/2024/03/budget-open-thread.html

Lots to think about, and I hope we can do so without some of the inanities that have popped up BTL here over the past two years.  Is that overly-optimistic?  For the avoidance of doubt, nobody ...

http://www.cityunslicker.co.uk/2024/03/3-aspects-of-russias-war-on-ukraine.html

There are quite a few on the 'progressive', lefty side of the divide who believe that votes for 16 year-olds is a guaranteed way to lock in a majority for evahh.   Hmm.  The more rational ac...

http://www.cityunslicker.co.uk/2024/02/votes-for-those-gullible-16-year-olds.html

 One of the questions in this year's Predictions Compo is: Size of V. Putin's share of the Russian vote (as announced) I have news from my quite-good-but-not-wholly-reliable Russian sources th...

http://www.cityunslicker.co.uk/2024/02/2024-predictions-compo-update.html

Recently Ukraine's President Zelensky caused a stir (rapidly overtaken by other news) when firing his fairly well-regarded Commander of Joint Forces Gen Zaluzhnyi.  Political machinations?  A s...

http://www.cityunslicker.co.uk/2024/02/sacking-generals.html

A couple of weeks ago at Mr Wendland's prompting, I undertook to post on the putative Sizewell C contract, currently "under negotiation" with EDF and various financial parties.  I'd said it was...

http://www.cityunslicker.co.uk/2024/02/the-sizewell-c-rab-abomination.html

As oft-noted here, Evans-Pritchard is often amusingly contrarian with an interesting point to make; and equally often just plain bonkers.  His latest DTel offering - fresh from his triumphant i...

http://www.cityunslicker.co.uk/2024/02/aep-on-green-boom-not-quite-full-picture.html

It may seem quixotic to pick on any one highly suspect facet of the vague 'Net Zero' plans we, along with every other western nation, have to pay lip-service to these days.  But here's one that ...

http://www.cityunslicker.co.uk/2024/02/gas-industry-and-shrinking-critical-mass.html

Apparently the Welsh are intending to 'reform' the Council Tax.  Of the 3 options under consideration , one is feeble: simple revaluing all properties.  The 2nd changes the weighting within the...

http://www.cityunslicker.co.uk/2024/01/reforming-council-tax-in-wales-good.html

+ + UPDATED + +   - SEE BELOW Defence projects are the bane of the taxpayer's existence.  (Along with NHS IT projects, PPS procurement etc etc etc).  Astonishing delays, budget over-runs, f...

http://www.cityunslicker.co.uk/2024/01/government-introduces-its-stellar.html

REVANCHISM is generally understood in 20th century Leninist or Maoist terms: the capitalist / imperialist classes lashing out against their progressive tormentors.  But it might equally be appli...

http://www.cityunslicker.co.uk/2024/01/taxing-english-or-taxing-its.html

It may seem perverse to wonder whether the USA is withdrawing into an isolationist shell only a couple of days after it has orchestrated a rather modest coalition into military action against the...

http://www.cityunslicker.co.uk/2024/01/usa-withdrawing-from-world-affairs.html