Lloyds Banking Share Discussion Threads

[stewart64] 31/12/2020 08:32

I didn't think in my wildest dreams that 10 months on from the 23rd March 2020 when the FTSE 100 finished at 4993 that we would be in a third National lockdown and the Government would have printed half a trillion to pay employees and business' to do nothing. Why things were so pessimistic back then and so optimistic now puzzles me.

[stewart64] 31/12/2020 08:11

The Market reacting now to virtual National lockdown. Brexit deal or not I reckon 6600 on the FTSE 100 was a tad optimistic post festivities. A Government that is clueless on vaccine roll numbers out leaves Recovery anybody's guess.

[xxxxxy] 31/12/2020 07:47

From Daily Telegraph...Entrepreneurs are racing to capitalise on the Covid pandemic by setting up online retail businesses as part of a boom in new start-ups.The number of firms incorporated in Britain during the four weeks to mid-December was over a third higher than during the same period last year, with the growth rate in double digits since June – a jump thought to be triggered by laid-off workers who were forced to start a new venture to make up for their loss of income.This growth is thought to have been triggered in large part by new online outlets. Registrations were up in food and drink production and takeaway food firms operating mostly on the internet, according to an analysis of official data for the first 11 months of the year by the University of Kent. 

[bargainbob] 31/12/2020 06:43

Mayor advance since leaving EU, Pete is changing his name to Cheshire Peter.

It is right after 50years to change it back to Peter now we are free from EU control, poster previously known as Pete said .

[utrickytrees] 31/12/2020 04:45

Even with the BBC on its side remain couldnt sell a populist message to M2's bin men. They were pedalling tariffs, quotas and ARMAGEDDON but in all reality the only thing that's changed is that Tiddles needs a passport for Palma. It would appear the thicko Binmen wernt so thick afterall lol. Indeed if you want thick/ naive look no further than remain which was popular with the young and people (but particularly women) with no previous interest in politics. Remain couldn't even get over the line with the advantage of the status quo behind them. Remains campaign was lazy contemptuous & transparent and all but the most intellectually challenged could see through it.

[k38] 31/12/2020 00:52

Excellent report (post) maxk.

[maxk] 31/12/2020 00:03

Brexit Britain will be Europe’s biggest economy if Boris plays his cards right

Once the pandemic is tamed, the UK now has the freedoms it needs to race ahead of a failing EU


LIAM HALLIGAN
30 December 2020 • 9:30pm
Liam Halligan






“For years, all supposedly sensible pundits have told us Brexit spells doom for Britain – now they must eat their words”. This sentence was uttered not by Boris Johnson, nor by one of his loyal lieutenants. Nor did it come from the European Research Group of Tory Brexiteers, who yesterday helped the Prime Minister’s EU free trade agreement sail through the House of Commons.

These are the sentiments of Alexander Von Schoenburg, editor of Bild, Germany’s best-selling newspaper. “Just because someone has tangled hair, is prone to bursting into Latin and has a somewhat chaotic private life doesn’t mean they cannot be a statesman of historic importance,” he wrote yesterday. “Europeans of all stripes now know Johnson as the man who stood up to the behemoth that is the European bloc and, against all the odds, won the day for his country.”

Having clinched an EU trade deal many said was impossible, the Prime Minister is entitled to feel vindicated. A few Remainer refusniks will keep moaning. But most voters are relieved that, after four and a half years of squabbling, we’ve finally got Brexit done. By “taking back control” from Brussels, while guaranteeing zero-tariff trade with the EU, Johnson has confounded his critics. Amid endless no-deal catastrophism, he convinced the EU we were prepared to rely on World Trade Organisation rules – which made a trade deal more likely.

Having navigated the tricky withdrawal process, however, Johnson must now demonstrate Britain can use our new post-Brexit freedoms to thrive.

We’ve come a long way since mid-2016, when the Treasury insisted that merely voting to leave would spark “an immediate and profound ­economic shock”. The British economy stood firm, recording solid growth, high employment and strong public finances, exposing the massed ranks of Remainer mandarins to ridicule.

Now, as mass vaccination gets going, Johnson can once again gainsay “all supposedly sensible pundits” by proving that Brexit can boost the UK economy, not least because of our UK-EU free trade deal.

All the ingredients are there. Outside the EU’s single market, the UK is free of the highly-politicised European Court of Justice – which imposes huge restrictions on our economic freedom, while requiring multi-billion-pound annual EU payments. Within the single market, all UK firms – including the 95 per cent that don’t export to the EU – must comply with unnecessary and expensive EU rules. Now they don’t. Also, the single market in services barely exists – so that’s no loss either.

Since 1999, the share of UK exports to the EU has fallen from around 60 to 40 per cent. Our EU trade is shrinking, then, while generating a deficit, detracting from UK wealth – despite the single market. Our non-EU trade, meanwhile, is rising fast, makes up the majority of Britain’s international commerce and generates a surplus. We need to build on that – not least because, over the coming two decades, nine-tenths of global growth will happen beyond the EU.

That’s also why the UK benefits from being outside the EU’s customs union – a tariff wall which has made imports from beyond Europe more expensive for British shoppers. Such charges were sent to Brussels, with the UK paying disproportionately given that most of our trade is already beyond Europe.


Outside the customs union we avoid those charges, while also being able to strike UK-specific trade deals – benefiting Britain’s vibrant export sectors, in contrast to agreements dictated by France and Germany. Already, Trade Secretary Liz Truss has secured over 60 UK trade deals, with more in the pipeline. Some 85 per cent of the world economy is outside the EU – including the world’s fastest-growing and most populous economies. Britain should now seek lucrative agreements with the largest players, not least the US and China – deals that have long eluded Brussels, given intra-EU conflicts.

Closer to home, Johnson must put Brexit at the heart of his “levelling up” agenda, as the economy recovers from Covid. Within days, we regain control over billions of pounds of “cohesion fund” spending, which can help tackle regional inequalities. Free of EU state aid rules, the Government can take stakes in industries of the future like AI and biotech, which can flourish beyond the EU’s regulatory clutches. Freeports and enterprise zones, low-tax jurisdictions bringing investment and prosperity to coastal towns and other deprived areas, can also address regional imbalances – and, again, are only possible outside the EU.

And were we still in the EU, where another bond market crisis looms, Britain would be paying into the €750 billion (£670 billion) eurozone rescue fund. Since we left, Brussels is now authorised to borrow on the EU’s behalf – an expensive and perilous step towards fiscal integration, which is anathema to Britain.

While economic recovery costs money, this “new chapter” of British commerce should focus on harnessing long-term private capital, tax breaks and, above all, vigorous supply-side reforms – all of which are far easier after Brexit.

As the clouds of uncertainty lift – and once the pandemic is finally tamed – economists are concluding that post-Brexit Britain could boom. The highly respected Centre for Economic and Business Research now predicts that the UK will outperform the EU over the next 15 years, becoming almost 25 per cent larger than France by the middle of the next decade. As we continue to attract the lion’s share of inward investment into Europe, Britain is on course to outstrip the German economy by 2040.

The UK faces deep challenges – going beyond Covid. Low productivity, for instance, means resources must be poured into vocational education. But our full-deal Brexit presents huge economic advantages, which Johnson must now bring to bear.

“We are with Europe, but not of it,” wrote Winston Churchill in 1930. “We are linked but not compromised, interested and associated but not absorbed”. Thanks to Johnson’s skill and cunning, Churchill’s observation once again rings true. But having secured political success with Brexit, the Prime Minister must secure economic prosperity too, as he builds Britain’s New Jerusalem, leading us beyond the fraught uncertainties of 2020, into the new year and beyond.

[k38] 30/12/2020 23:33

Funny...lololol.....That's why they call you remain-ers or bend overs....;))"What Brexit really means is taking back control of the things we haven’t lost, to lose control of the things we already have."

[maxk] 30/12/2020 23:32

No gong for Nigel .. anyone surprised?

[minerve 2] 30/12/2020 23:25

What do Farage supporters think about that?

Anyone with an iota of intelligence or curiosity would question his integrity.

[misterbluesky] 30/12/2020 23:24

Brexit was supposed to be about ‘taking back control’.

What Brexit really means is taking back control of the things we haven’t lost, to lose control of the things we already have.

[minerve 2] 30/12/2020 23:24

WRT Farage:

Maybe they should turn their fire on the smug Farage, after all he attended 1 out of 42 EU fishery committee meetings during his tenure in Brussels and taking home a nice salary and expenses. But then shows up at fishery protests as their great leader and supporter. Another one from the Boris stable of lies, deceit and outright untruths....

[k38] 30/12/2020 23:17

Funny no one explain in a what way this deal is a bad deal..On the other hand a bad deal would mean going against the Brexit idea of getting back control and no giving it back with a new deal.This deal is a good deal but a bad deal for remainers.. I can understand that...;))

[minerve 2] 30/12/2020 23:01

All very depressing if you understand the realities.

[misterbluesky] 30/12/2020 22:59

For most MPs (including Labour Party MPs) the choice was between no-deal and a bad-deal.

They decided to choose best of the worst options.

It doesn't mean this Brexit deal is a good one.

[cheshire pete] 30/12/2020 22:52

Off to bed now....feeling tired after all the Brexit fresh air.

[k38] 30/12/2020 22:50

By the way.. the muppets are 521,
tonight No one forse them to vote for.. but they had no guts to vote against......;))


The rest do not count as they have their own agenda.

[k38] 30/12/2020 22:48

M2


We have a deal, we have taken back control of this country.. others still suffering and as long as br6do not change course more suffering in the future for most of the our European friends...



Unless the EU break up and start from scratch!!

[minerve 2] 30/12/2020 22:42

k38

Of course, most Tory MPs are puppets who got in purely on the Brexit question, which in itself was a lie. Watch them being interviewed, nothing like the calibre of Governments past - on both sides.

All because someone votes to do something doesn’t endorse that it is a right decision. Do you understand the difference?

[minerve 2] 30/12/2020 22:39

Small-time landlords are not affected.

[k38] 30/12/2020 22:39

M2For the record...... for 521 - 73 against Lol....

[minerve 2] 30/12/2020 22:39

But cheshire is county challenged. What does he know about working, travelling and trading at his age?