Finance sector news
Below are a few of the news stories doing the round:
Mortgages granted in the UK are down by half on this time last year and mortgage spending is down to a record low, however the number of re-mortages was slightly up on previous months.
The Bank Of England has announced that it will print £75 billion currency over the next 3 months to prop up the markets, this will see savers lose out even further but will see borrowers who have tracker mortgages gain from the recent rate cuts.
Devaluation of the Pound is always the last card to play and it means we are facing a bad few years, I personally am surprised that Gordon Brown stands back and lets this happen. Although as someone pointed out to me, incumbent governments have a habit of making the financial system as bad as possible and wizard like resolving things 6 months before a general election giving everyone a tasty bonus to vote the right way. Is this Gordons way of making things look really bad and then making himself look great when he saves us all?
The Royal Bank of Scotland and Natwest have both refused to pass on the recent mortgage rate cut, even though they are now mostly owned by the Public after money was pumped in to save them. Is this not a damning inditement of the way the goverment/BOE have dealt with the financial crisis? The industry needs to be regulated but not strangled, a healthy sustainable mortgage market is one which can offer good deals to customers and still make profit. The present situation is a false paradise for borrowers and a lose-lose situation for savers, what will happen in 6 months time? will things be reversed or equaled out.