The Anonymous Widower

Is Mark Carney A Lucky Governor?

Napoleon is reputed to have said.

I know he’s a good general, but is he lucky?

Mark Carney may or may not be a good central banker, but he certainly seems to have arrived in his new job, just as the recovery in the economy seems to be starting. It’s reported here in the Independent.

So it would seem that Cameron and Osborne, might have been influenced by Napoleon’s words, as Mark Carney does appear to have the luck to inherit good figures.  Perhaps tough, Mervyn King should be given more credit, as it would seem that things got going under his stewardship of the Bank!

But we’ve seen this economy inheritance before.  Tony Blair inherited a good economy and then proceeded to waste it all, so that his successor left us in the mess we are today.

It’s not that we have boom and bust, we have had a succession of governments in this country of generally a pretty good one followed by one that isn’t that good at all. I’m not going to play party politics here, as you can find bad governments of both left and right. And good and bad periods of governments that were in power for a long time. Find me a man or woman, who says that everything Margaret Thatcher or Tony Blair did was good, and I’ll show you a liar.

Perhaps we need to have more of the country run by independent organisations like the Bank of England and the BBC. Why for instance, isn’t the NHS, totally removed from the meddling of politicians? After all, how many politicians could successfully run a whelk stall?

To return to the economy, Mark Carney has said that interest rates could possibly rise next year.

They already are!

My Zopa figures are showing that their five ear loans, which  were about 4.5% earlier in the year, have been rising slightly in recent weeks and now sit at 4.8%. I haven’t had a major bad debt for six months and the only blot is that my true returns are still stuck between 4 and 4.5% before tax, and are marginally down on last year.

As I believe Zopa is a stable system, where the sensible, savvy lenders, provide loans for canny borrowers of good credit, it could be a good marker as to the way the market is going.

November 14, 2013 - Posted by AnonW | Finance, News | Banks, Economy, Mark Carney, Peer-to-Peer Lending, Zopa