George Backs Graphene
This report says that the Chancellor has found £21.5 million for research into graphene.
Some of the applications of graphene are listed here on Wikipedia. This is the first paragraph.
Several potential applications for graphene are under development, and many more have been proposed. These include lightweight, thin, flexible, yet durable display screens, electric circuits, and solar cells, as well as various medical, chemical, and industrial processes enhanced or enabled by the use of new graphene materials.
Of all the possible applications they list, graphene’s properties as a filtration membrane, may lead to some of the first widespread applications. This link points to an article about research at MIT, which shows that graphene may offer new ways of water desalination.
Graphene may seem to be a wonder material and the money for research is very much to be welcomed.
In the 1960s, there were two areas of research, for which great hopes were held out.
The first was carbon fibre, which when tried as fan blades for the RB 211 helped to bankrupt Rolls-Royce. But now, it is a ubiquitous substance, that appears in many applications, from golf club shafts to almost complete aircraft, like the Boeing Dreamliner.
A scientific curiosity at the time was the laser. Every university had one and would proudly show you their expensive example, generally doing nothing, except emitting an eerie green light. But now lasers are everywhere and most homes have at least one in a CD or DVD player.
Who will accurately predict what the uses of graphene will be in fifty years?
My only questions are.
1. Are we putting enough money and resources behind the researchers?
2. What other ideas are there out there with the potential to change the world for the better, that need proper backing?
I Get Two Possible Christmas Day Lenders On Zopa
My lending pot is empty, but today, I did get two new lenders, who are wanting to borrow money on Zopa. Obviously, they may not pass the credit checks, but they did apply on Christmas Day.
One canny Scot got an offer to borrow £5,000 at 5.8% and an East Ender got one to borrow £1,200 at 6.1%. Both were considered to be A* or the most highly-rated borrowers.
Julian Knight Hits Two Targets With One Stone
I have a trawl looking for peer-to-peer lending stories and it picked up this article in the Independent by Julian Knight.
He starts by giving an excellent review of peer-to-peer lending and the broadening of financial services in general, saying it is broader in the United States. He concludes by saying.
This, I’d argue, is one of the reasons why in the US they are more entrepreneurial and start-ups get a chance to, well, start up.
He then goes on to talk about some of my least favourite people; chuggers. This his concluding paragraph.
The town of Shrewsbury blazed a trail by banning these individuals last year and now we seem finally to be consigning chuggers to the same place as the likes of the squeegee merchants.
Incidentally, a chugger at the Angel last week, virtually chased me into the road. If there’d been a policeman about, I’d have made a complaint. On the other hand, life is too short.
I shall follow Julian in future.
Zopa Was Processing Loans On Christmas Eve
Yesterday, I had nine loans shown being processed in my morning view of my Zopa account, with a total value of £830, but this morning those figures are 6 loans and £600. The interest has also gone up by a few pounds, so I suspect a couple of payments crept into Zopa from borrowers.
So somebody must have been working yesterday to OK the three loans that were added to my portfolio.
At least now, I’ll know if someone applies for a loan on Christmas Day, as I’ve got a few pounds in Zopa’s lending pot. This is contrary to what I said yesterday.
I bet your bank didn’t process your loan application yesterday!
A Good Reason To Avoid Facebook
I do anyway, but their tax position, seems to be in line with Starbucks, Amazon and Google according to this report.
In fact, it’s rapidly getting to the point, where using a large company reduces tax revenues. Although, it does seem that American companies are the best at finding ways of avoiding paying tax. Or should that be worst?
If you think I’m being sanctimonious here, I once paid a tax bill of £3,500,000. If you don’t believe me, I have the cheque on the wall to prove it. I could have avoided the tax bill, by going to live in Monaco or somewhere equally boring for a few years. But then this country has so many good things, that I’d miss.
Another High Interest Lender Hits The Streets
Or that’s what I think it is!
At least the adverts seem to discourage you from contacting the company, by making you vomit.
I’ve Missed An Opportunity With Zopa
As I always do, I just checked my Zopa statistics this morning. Not that anything untoward or otherwise happens on a Sunday!
I like analysing statistics and it would ave been great fun to see if anybody apply for any loans over the holiday.
But at present, I’ve only got the princely sum of £0.39 available. So I won’t be able to collect any data.
I bet though, if you apply for a loan to Wonga on Christmas day, you’ll get a loan!
I’ve just looked back at my Zopa data for Christmas 2011 and it would appear that I did make a loan on Christmas Day. Obviously, it wasn’t processed until a few days later.
But why shouldn’t you apply for a loan on Christmas Day from a reputable lender? After all, the computers on which you perform your application never sleep. Or aren’t supposed to!
Andrew Haldane On Peer-to-Peer Lending
This quote from Andy Haldane, a director of the Bank of England in the Independent is very ominous, if you’re a banker.
The mono-banking culture is on its way out. Instead, we are seeing a much more diverse eco-system emerging with the growth of new non-bank groups offering peer-to peer lending and crowd-funding.
Few are going to be upset, if more bankers are out of a job.
Do We Need A Bank?
Nationwide seem to have got it right here, even if I didn’t get the whole slogan in the picture.
Do We Need A Bank?
But I think the only reason for having a bank, is to have a nice warm place on a cold, wet day to go into, to use the cash machine.
Wonga Move Into Credit Card Territory
According to this article from the BBC, Wonga are moving into credit card and web fulfilment territory with their latest service called PayLater.
Although, I’m not a fan of Wonga, it could be a good idea, provided they moderate their interest rates.
Would I like to see someone like Zopa or Ratesetter doing the same? Only of course, if they didn’t relax their credit checks.
After all, for years, with many products and some big purchases like cars, finance has been an integral part of the process.
The trouble with something like Zopa doing this, could be, that if the loan is turned down, then the sale could be lost.
But Wonga’s thinking does show how the banks and credit card companies are getting it in the neck from the new financial innovators.
The Anonymous Widower 