Money Week

The pound could hit parity with the euro – but if it does, buy it

Anyone travelling to the continent from the UK this summer will have, no doubt, winced every time they’ve had to pay for anything.

The euro has been strong – surprisingly so – while the pound (and the US dollar) have been weak.

Today, I want to consider the euro against the ...

today 09:35

Markets aren’t pricing in a political panic

The conventional market wisdom for much of the 1990s and pretty much all of the early 2000s was that “government doesn’t matter”.

Markets were in the ascendant everywhere. We lived in a globalised world, where pretty much everyone – with a few stubborn hold-outs – agreed that ...

yesterday 10:29

US stocks may be more overvalued than they’ve ever been before

US stocks are overvalued.

It’s been like this for a long time. And in fact, I’d argue that it’s an entirely uncontroversial thing to say.

Any objective observer would admit that by most – if not all – traditional measures of valuation, US stocks are expensive.

But a ...

2017-08-21 12:17

Leaving the Customs Union could cause border chaos

The extent to which the UK should remain in the European Union’s Customs Union is currently a big topic for debate at the moment. It could also have important consequences for the support and logistics industry, and by implication, for firms and businesses up and down the country. We’ve ...

2017-08-21 11:11

Five ways to build a better Brexit

The serious business of negotiating Brexit will soon be underway. The government is about to publish a series of position papers, which will set out its thinking on everything from the border with the Republic of Ireland, to technology, immigration, regulation and taxations. We saw the first of ...

2017-08-20 13:11

The NHS funding gap

Britain’s National Health Service always seems to be in crisis and running out of cash. Is it really, and what can be done? Alex Rankine reports.

The Department of Health plans to spend £123.7bn on health in England in 2017/2018 – roughly £2,200 per head and 18% of total state ...

2017-08-19 19:35

How the credit crunch of 1966 set the tone for central banks

I thought we’d dig into a bit of financial history this morning. This is the first in an occasional series I’ll be running once a week or so.

Specifically, given today’s interesting and slightly precarious-feeling environment, I want to delve into periods where it’s all gone ...

2017-08-18 11:39

This week in MoneyWeek: The TV stocks to watch

In this week’s MoneyWeek magazine, how to profit from the golden age of television; emerging-market small-caps to buy now; and how to profit from dull metals. Plus, why you should set up a pension for your child; how landlords can vet prospective tenants; and five ways to build a ...

2017-08-18 10:33

Book, film and theatre reviews

MoneyWeek's film theatre and book reviews – A look at some of the best financial books on the shelves at the moment, plus film and theatre reviews.

Book review: Outsiders A warning to politicians not to take the “powerlessness of power” for granted.

By: Dr Matthew ...

2017-08-18 09:27

Paul Mumford: simple steps to successful investing

Merryn Somerset Webb talks to veteran fund manager Paul Mumford about the secret of his successful career and the stocks he’s buying now.

• If you missed any of Merryn’s past interviews, you can see them all here.

Merryn: Hi, I’m Merryn Somerset Webb, ...

2017-08-18 09:27

Online Isa & Sipp providers cost comparison table

£99+VAT, refunded as long as you maintain an X-O share dealing account linked to your SIPP

...

2017-08-18 09:27

Profit from the golden age of television

How we watch TV is going through dramatic changes, with a rise in streaming services leading to a surge in demand for content. Matthew Partridge looks at how to [...]

...

2017-08-17 19:39

The credit crunch, a decade on: things were grim, even before Lehman exploded

One more blast from the past this week.

This is from summer 2008. It’s really just a rundown of what was going on in the UK at the time – profit warnings from Taylor Wimpey and M&S were just two prominent signs that all was not well with the UK economy.

It’s a ...

2017-08-17 11:33

Bitcoin is a bubble – but bubbles change the world

Another day, another new high in bitcoin.

Oh, my goodness me.

When and where is it going to end?

The price of a bitcoin is $4,250 as I write this. It’ll probably be $5,000 by the time you read it.

The comment is not quite as flippant as it sounds. Bitcoin rose 20% over ...

2017-08-16 12:27

The credit crunch ten years on: the slow collapse of the banks

As I’m out of the office this week, I’ve been taking a flick through the MoneyWeek and Money Morning archives.

It’s always interesting to see how events were reported at the time. It’s also interesting to see how the authorities reacted.

The Money Morning ...

2017-08-15 12:15

‘Micro-confidence’ and ‘macro-pessimism’: why UK entrepreneurs are in two minds about Brexit

There is general agreement that entrepreneurs are the lifeblood of the British economy – they create the jobs and wealth needed to keep things running. That’s why it’s important to look at how they are being affected by Brexit.

One person who deals with them on a regular basis is Guy ...

2017-08-14 14:15

Happy anniversary! Remembering the credit crunch, ten years on

I’m out of the office this week.

So given that it’s currently around about the tenth anniversary of the great financial crisis kicking off (depending on exactly when you date it from), I thought I’d reprint an old piece from the archives.

Below is a cover story I ...

2017-08-14 12:03

The people versus Trump

Many think US president Donald Trump is dangerously incompetent. Local politicians are taking matters into their own hands. Simon Wilson reports.

As far as many Americans are concerned, the United States is being led by a dishonest and unstable narcissist who is proving thoroughly ...

2017-08-13 12:57

Better investing will solve inequality

Why do the rich keep getting richer? A new paper published in Sweden puts forward a theory. It’s because they are better investors. The paper, from the Stockholm School of Economics, took historical data from wealth surveys to measure how different income groups performed over a long period of ...

2017-08-12 19:21

How worried are investors about North Korea? Take a look at the charts

Trump has been trading insults with North Korea’s Kim Jong-un

This week has been dominated by fears over conflict with North Korea. US president Donald Trump and North Korea’s Kim Jong-un have been trading insults [...]

...

2017-08-12 12:45

Chart of the week: ignore the chatter about the Dow Jones index

There was a lot of hoo-ha about the Dow Jones index’s jump above the 22,000 mark. Yet the Dow “is a meaningless index”, as the FT’s John Authers points out. It is weighted by share price rather than market capitalisation, leading to “absurd distortions”.

If a firm’s ...

2017-08-11 16:57