[easypeasy]

we fund the bank of england, the bank of england funds commercial high street banks (eg northern rock), high street banks fund us with loans, we fund the bank of england, the bank of england funds commercial high street banks, high street banks fund us with loans................anybody else wonder why we are forced to let the middlemen profit from having our money?

[KissyLittleMissy]

place your only £20,000 you have got left in the world in your hands and think what you would like to do with it? I would like to place it safely and securely in a bank account and have a cashpoint card and a cheque and paying in book and know that my money is safe. some people buy floor safes or wall safes or hide it under their matress, but its safer in the bank

what happened to northern rock is sad, but gordon brown has said that he will guarantee that all northern rock customers will not lose any of their money no matter what happens. i do see your point about middlemen but banks only have one thing in mind and their customers come second you know. my dad lost his temper in a bank once and took all his money out. the bank just gave him his money and said "have a nice day"

[easypeasy]

gorden brown is promising to spend taxpayers money to finance a private business that profits from taxpayers money...........its a loop of fraud and deception and most people cant see it because its right under their nose.

[KissyLittleMissy]

Originally posted by easypeasy
gorden brown is promising to spend taxpayers money to finance a private business that profits from taxpayers money...........its a loop of fraud and deception and most people cant see it because its right under their nose.

that doesnt surprise me at all really. when it comes to election time, the labour party will paint the best picture imaginable for the voters. fraud is always going on but i am sure that gordon brown will have a reason to give. thats the troubl with these politicians, their reputation stinks

[spacebandit]

In the free market place the Government likes to ram down our throats at every available opportunity as the be and end all of fiscal proprietry, the Northern Rock was heavily dependent on income from US Subprime loans.

Subprime loans were loans made to people who were already in a default situation with one mortgage, those loans were then sold off to companies outside of the US and for a short time made big profits.

It was essentially nothing more than a grand pyramid scheme - the warning bells were first sounded before last Christmas - it still didn't stop the likes of Northern Rock continuing to invest in them.

Would you loan large amounts of money to people who had already defaulted on thier loans - were already in large amounts of debt ?

or would it be better to help those people out of their financial problems ?

Unfortunately there is no profit in the latter.

So the get rich quick money merchants in the US developed "subprime" - then they sold them on to equally greedy middlemen in places like the UK

Northern Rock bought into it big time, in what has now been described as an "extreme financial model" - in other words they took serious risks and now the Bank Of England is bailing them out with taxpayer money.

I will wager the Northern Rock shareholders still get their yearly dividend

According to its own rules the Bank Of England is not allowed to loan monies to financially unviable institutions - in a free market the Northern Rocks customers withdrawing of their money at the rate they were would have made Northern Rock economically unviable in 4 days - the shareholders would then have been in default

So the "free market economy" was intefered with - against the BoE's own rules, but with the connivance of the Chancellor of the Exchequer and using public money they shored up a stock held company.

Northern Rock played the stock options market, and the warning "value of shares can go down as well as up" - clearly no longer applies to shareholders in companies such as Nortern Rock - as they will be bailed out with "my" money, even though it is the company managers who are at fault

If I play the markets I get no such promise of being bailed out if I mess up

What happens when the next bank or building society is in trouble ?

Does the Bank Of England bail that one out ?

What about the one after that and so on and so on ?

If not why not ?

Surely if you bail out one bank that was using a dodgy business model to generate income you must bail out all of the others..

Does the bank of england bankrupt itself whilst the shareholders of affected companies still get their annual dividends ?

Why did the bank Of England not bail out BCCI when it was in a very similar situation to Northern Rock 4 months before it went bust ?

If we live in a free market economy, as the Government insists we do, the Northern Rock should have been left to find its own place - instead the free market economy was intefered with for purely political reasons.

There is a fall coming - and the Bank Of England and our Government should not be re-writing its own rules to seek short term political stability and playing fast and loose with "my" money.

What if my bank goes the same way ?

Will I be unhappy ?

Yes

but as the small print says

"can go down as well as up"

[easypeasy]

Thats one hell of a big can of worms opened, hehe. it makes me wonder who has the biggest shares in northern rock....... dare i speculate the same people who fund the labour party or bend the rules to suit themselves?
It's obviusly not a party political thing because you can be sure tory party members have their fingers in the same pie.
I'm no financial whizzkid and i groan and turn over when business news comes on the tv, but i know a scam when i see one.

[spacebandit]

Originally posted by easypeasy
Thats one hell of a big can of worms opened, hehe. it makes me wonder who has the biggest shares in northern rock....... dare i speculate the same people who fund the labour party or bend the rules to suit themselves?
It's obviusly not a party political thing because you can be sure tory party members have their fingers in the same pie.
I'm no financial whizzkid and i groan and turn over when business news comes on the tv, but i know a scam when i see one.

I think it goes across the whole political spectrum, when it comes to MP's earnings outside of school its all one big jolly boys outing - and they look after each others interests.

Try looking up the register of members interests, if you are interested in what your MP earns outside of representing you

http://www.parliament.uk/about_commo..._interests.cfm

[edit - it appears to no longer include the full list of all members and only lists the updates- do not know why, will try and find out]