alamcculloch:
Unlike most of you , I have the chance to vote S.N.P. ,What could possibly go wrong?!!!
Lolol!
138k is not bad going.My pension lost about 20% with the ukraine war but has only just recovered to what it was.But now we are faced with a war in Taiwan that might wreck havoc with share prices again,so I think now is the time to invest in safer funds like bonds? If you are able to switch funds.If that is possible.I dont know much about these things.Its funny,looking back,I was watching the tv when the ukraine war kicked off.I could have switched everything to cash,then bought in again once the big dip in prices happened,but it just seemed a drastic thing to do at the time,but if I had done it,it would made money
As I said at the start of the year, Mine has gone down by a full third in the past year, and I suspect the reasons are as follows:
(1) Pension funds being talked into over-investing in the interest rate futures market on margin (by buying bonds with borrowed money)
Those bonds then go down, and the pension fund is forced to sell at a loss, not able to come up with enough new money to otherwise make the “Margin Call”.
I was appalled to find out that “Pension Funds” were even ALLOWED to speculate in this way, casino banking style, or buy any investment at all on “Margin”…
If we were going to be “taking risks” with the pension fund money after all, - wouldn’t it have made more sense to simply buy up the entire FTSE-100 constituents and nothing else such as bonds paying <1% interest for the past decade?
(2) Funds may also have been talked into shorting the Russian Ruble, and confiscating the accounts of any Russian with more than a million with them…
Whilst some Russians would have lost some cash this way, a lot of NON Russians may have taken flight, and moved their money out of the pension funds altogether, hence the “Runs on Banks” we’ve been seeing of late…
This, in turn - forces the pension fund to dispose of assets to raise the capital to pay out those early leavers…
The rest of us still “in” - Get a letter curtly telling us that our projected pension has dropped by a third in my case, but others in differing funds - are going to see say a half or maybe “only” a quarter gone…
There are NO excuses for ANY pension fund to be losing money since the lockdown - as the Stock Market has never looked better, and THAT is what the money is SUPPOSED to be invested in - Right? 
(3) Funds have been talked out of investing in Fossil Fuels/Mining - which has made a packet this past decade, despite the price of Oil collapsed in 2020… Energy companies are of course bathing in our cash as we pay ever-higher bills too, with no sign of retail prices coming down, despite the price of Gas alone down by over 90% since the high spike of a year ago, coiniciding with the invasion of Ukraine…
Meanwhile, pension fund investment has gone into things like Wind Turbines, which break down all the time, send our invested cash overseas to be spent on follies there rather than here in the UK, and of course - creates no UK jobs for us, although the Remainers would argue “Ah, if we’d stayed in the EU - those jobs would have not gone overseas”…
OUR cash taken away from us then, OUR cash denied us in the form of higher wages, OUR cash given away to countries that are not our ally, and OUR cash being wasted keeping unelected people in power to do “more of the same”. The growing pile of Political Figures mounts as more elected persons get brought down by these Deep State “Perma-Staff” in Whitehall.
Whatever the full truth of this - we won’t be retiring by the age of 65 anymore, alas.
Pandemic Part II “Epidemic” - will put paid to a lot of us even reaching the age 65 in any case, so the State don’t have to pay out for our state pensions neither… Wifey will likely succumb to “financial stresses” and in any case - won’t have enough cash to bring class actions against the greatest criminal minds of our lifetime, and that includes people born Pre-War too! 
md1987:
alamcculloch:
Unlike most of you , I have the chance to vote S.N.P. ,What could possibly go wrong?!!!Lolol!
There’s only the three parties on my ballot paper - as per usual.
“Spoiling my Paper” and writing “None of the Above” - doesn’t bring much comfort, alas… 
Big Truck:
the maoster:
Anyone else had a bad year with the value of their pension pot taking a right kicking over the last year?I was talking to a mate the other week who has seen the value of his pension pot decimated by over 50%.
One of mine hasn’t lost anywhere near to 50% but it has dropped by £20k. Bad investments or just how it is?
Discuss.
ANY Investment Broker will “advise” that the worst thing you can do is look over your investments over ONE single year!!!
How have they done over TEN years is more like it!!!
Sent from my SM-A125F using Tapatalk
If you buy UK Long Gilts for 130 and then get forced to sell them for 102 during the period the “fall guys” Kwarteng and Truss got blamed for - then you’ve lost between a quarter and a third of your money invested…
If you’ve bought said bonds on margin - then you’ve lost a lot more than that, and you then get forced as a fund to sell perfectly good investments such as Precious Metals - to come up with the cash to pay out people leaving the fund in droves, because being “Russian” (albeit nothing to do with Putin’s Russia at all…) worry that they will be discriminated against by the Anti-Russian Witch Hunt currently in full swing…
That pretty much leaves left just those of us hoping to retire between now and the end of this decade - to foot the bill.
There’s not much chance of them making the fund back up to where it was, as that would require Casino-Banking risk-taking, which “isn’t usually allowed” on “Safely Invested Funds”… The losses are going to take the rest of this decade to replace, I estimate - with inflation set to erode the value of everyone’s pension by rather more than that by that point too…
The Lucky ones - are those who started to received their decent pension in 2020, during the lockdown - realizing that at this point they could live off that amount of money per week “Retirement Income”, and not bothering to come back to work after the furlough ended…
Yet, I still suspect we’ll have a government consisting of Labour, Tory, and Libdems at the next election - bearing in mind they are the only ones on ballot papers from what I can see…
Where’s Lord Buckethead when you need him? - The “Protest Vote Mop Candidate” …?
Winseer:
If you buy UK Long Gilts for 130 and then get forced to sell them for 102 during the period the “fall guys” Kwarteng and Truss got blamed for - then you’ve lost between a quarter and a third of your money invested…
That was the fault of the pension funds, google LDI crisis, basically a pension scheme is effectively borrowing to buy assets which don’t match liabilities — equities, PE, hedge funds, property — betting their value will increase more than the value of liabilities which of course they didn’t. The Bank of England bought UK long gilts, about £30Bn worth to prop up the pension sector and sold them all by mid Jan 2023 for a profit. Yes that’s right cav551 the “Liz Truss cost the country £30Bn” crap that gets spouted which you fully believe was actually the Bank of England spending money and not the government and it made a profit on that.
Conor:
Franglais:
To refresh your memory here is what the Economy was actually doing under Brown. In 1997 he started as Chancellor until 2010 ended as PM.
macrotrends.net/countries/G … per-capita
What do you see?Ah the old “GDP per capita displayed in USD” not GBP trick common amongst left wing remoaners, especially journalists, in order to try to present a narrative that fits in with their “tories evil brexit bad” worldview. Why would you look at it in USD when you buy stuff in the UK in GBP? When you look at it in GBP it shows an entirely different story, one that shows constant growth from the bottom of the recession in 2009 until the crash caused by the pandemic in 2020.
statista.com/statistics/970 … in-the-uk/
And before you bang on about the value of sterling falling in 2016 which is why you do it in USD to try to make a point that muh evil torees made you poorer and making stuff more expensive may I suggest you do some research on historic inflation rates. The year Sterling devalued 16% against the USD the inflation rate was 1.01% peaking at 2.56% in 2017 before falling again.
What I see when I look at your graph is a 10 year boom from 1997 fuelled by a 300% rise in house prices and an increase in spending fuelled by a massive fivefold increase in personal debt from 1997-2008 enabled by a relaxing of lending rules. That was followed by massive drop of 24% in 2008 which wiped out half a decade of gains and which ended up deeper than it needed to be because Brown chose to ignore all the warnings the financial sector was telling him about unsustainable mortgage debt, the lack of any control over mortgage lending and the lack of fiscal rules over bank reserves which contributed to Northern Rock going bang and the UK government having to buy out RBS.
GDP per capita in USD is the default for most purposes. It isnt that I have chosen it particularly or that Statista is a Labour party stooge! USD as we know is the currency of international trade and the measure of a countrys performance.
If we use the countrys own currency 1930s Germany GDP per capita will look brilliant.
You honestly think exchange rates are irrelevant? If so you aren`t the only one.
youtube.com/watch?v=mIQnpoGBS1I
Yes lending rules were relaxed under Brown, and at that time it was a trend throughout the World, or the West at least.
So what were the Tory opposition saying about this? Before the Global crash there was no “clear water” between the parties fiscally. The Tories werent warning of the problems to come. A boom fuelled by borrowing? Labour borrowed too much, yes. The previous Major Tory Gov had "sold off the family silver" to fund their spending. And had they got the best price for the country? Or helped buy votes by selling it off cheaply just as Thatcher had done before? Governments borrowing to invest is not the same as a household borrowing to go on a holiday. Gov spending should increase productivity with better infrastructure, education, and health. Consumer borrowing is a different beast. And that increased with the deregulation of the Thatcher/Reagan era. Labour went too centrist and too far in their direction its true. They were too Tory.
So, the present problems are all due to Covid and nothing to do with Brexit and the current run of Tory Govs?
So why have all the G7, bar one, recovered to pre Covid levels? Why, since we have all had Covid problems, has the UK such a dire economic forecast compared with other developed economies?
Yes. Truss made no mistakes at all. The Labour party was wrong to kick her out of office.
Oh? What? It wasnt just Labour that thought she was a flake? The damage she did was cut short. Largely we are recovering from that. But the longer term reputational hit to the UK? Will investors look at us a stable economy in the future? Even the well known Brexiteer Rattycliff has set up factory for his new car in France. The pet economist of Brexit, Minford, was right about industry falling in the UK after Brexit. (Many people think thats a bad thing though)
Sploom:
138k is not bad going.My pension lost about 20% with the ukraine war but has only just recovered to what it was.But now we are faced with a war in Taiwan that might wreck havoc with share prices again,so I think now is the time to invest in safer funds like bonds? If you are able to switch funds.If that is possible.I dont know much about these things.Its funny,looking back,I was watching the tv when the ukraine war kicked off.I could have switched everything to cash,then bought in again once the big dip in prices happened,but it just seemed a drastic thing to do at the time,but if I had done it,it would made money
I started 20 bonds years & years ago ,girl at b/s thought I was mad , but last girl I spoke too could see why I did it , they’ve done ok , will use them yearly to top up pensions / other savings
The issue as I’ve said before is you may not make 65 , or if you do only a few years after , I’m 61 & have lost so many mates over the last few years , who have not made 65 or like Johnny h who’s funeral I just attended , 65 & dies of cancer , he spent all his life saving , worrying about tomorrow , always wanted to go on a world cruise , but money was better ( in his opinion ) put away for retirement , Liz his mrs said she’d said to him let’s have something to remember if anything happens , but Johnny said they had to make sure they had money when retired
I’ve piled the money away but after yet another one going too early I went straight down & booked another 2 week hol , as they say you can’t take it with you !!
Conor:
Winseer:
If you buy UK Long Gilts for 130 and then get forced to sell them for 102 during the period the “fall guys” Kwarteng and Truss got blamed for - then you’ve lost between a quarter and a third of your money invested…That was the fault of the pension funds, google LDI crisis, basically a pension scheme is effectively borrowing to buy assets which don’t match liabilities — equities, PE, hedge funds, property — betting their value will increase more than the value of liabilities which of course they didn’t. The Bank of England bought UK long gilts, about £30Bn worth to prop up the pension sector and sold them all by mid Jan 2023 for a profit. Yes that’s right cav551 the “Liz Truss cost the country £30Bn” crap that gets spouted which you fully believe was actually the Bank of England spending money and not the government and it made a profit on that.
When money is lost by one party (The Pension Funds) - It gets made by the counter party, in this case the bank of England.
It didn’t matter if the market rose after the pension funds were forced out at the temporary bottom of the market - the money is by that point lost, in this case into the Bank of England’s coffers, along with the Banks that are raking it in because of higher interest rates in which they have laid off in the financial futures market - by being SHORT the Bond Markets, worldwide…
So Banks and Energy companies are leeching all our cash away, with government encouraging this action.
…We’re not heading for “Hyper Inflation”, but rather a deflationary crash, where money is worth more rather than “Less”, but no one has any left, because debts are still being enforced, especially mortgage arrears type debts…
“You’ll own nothing, and be happy!”
Well, part 1 is clearly nearly done, but I don’t see how we’ll end up being “Happy” by any stretch of the imagination!
They control us - all the while the Left blame the Tories, and the Right blame the Tories rather than both sides of us blame the combined establishment, who’ll take all our stuff away, and give it to people you’'ll never meet, that only exist on paper, also known as “their own pockets by stealth”…
The only way out of this is to vote the whole lot out - whilst we still have some pretence of democracy in this country left…
Franglais:
Conor:
Franglais:
To refresh your memory here is what the Economy was actually doing under Brown. In 1997 he started as Chancellor until 2010 ended as PM.
macrotrends.net/countries/G … per-capita
What do you see?Ah the old “GDP per capita displayed in USD” not GBP trick common amongst left wing remoaners, especially journalists, in order to try to present a narrative that fits in with their “tories evil brexit bad” worldview. Why would you look at it in USD when you buy stuff in the UK in GBP? When you look at it in GBP it shows an entirely different story, one that shows constant growth from the bottom of the recession in 2009 until the crash caused by the pandemic in 2020.
statista.com/statistics/970 … in-the-uk/
And before you bang on about the value of sterling falling in 2016 which is why you do it in USD to try to make a point that muh evil torees made you poorer and making stuff more expensive may I suggest you do some research on historic inflation rates. The year Sterling devalued 16% against the USD the inflation rate was 1.01% peaking at 2.56% in 2017 before falling again.
What I see when I look at your graph is a 10 year boom from 1997 fuelled by a 300% rise in house prices and an increase in spending fuelled by a massive fivefold increase in personal debt from 1997-2008 enabled by a relaxing of lending rules. That was followed by massive drop of 24% in 2008 which wiped out half a decade of gains and which ended up deeper than it needed to be because Brown chose to ignore all the warnings the financial sector was telling him about unsustainable mortgage debt, the lack of any control over mortgage lending and the lack of fiscal rules over bank reserves which contributed to Northern Rock going bang and the UK government having to buy out RBS.
GDP per capita in USD is the default for most purposes. It isn
t that I have chosen it particularly or that Statista is a Labour party stooge! USD as we know is the currency of international trade and the measure of a countrys performance.
If we use the countrys own currency 1930s Germany GDP per capita will look brilliant.You honestly think exchange rates are irrelevant? If so you aren`t the only one.
youtube.com/watch?v=mIQnpoGBS1IYes lending rules were relaxed under Brown, and at that time it was a trend throughout the World, or the West at least.
So what were the Tory opposition saying about this? Before the Global crash there was no “clear water” between the parties fiscally. The Tories werent warning of the problems to come. A boom fuelled by borrowing? Labour borrowed too much, yes. The previous Major Tory Gov had "sold off the family silver" to fund their spending. And had they got the best price for the country? Or helped buy votes by selling it off cheaply just as Thatcher had done before? Governments borrowing to invest is not the same as a household borrowing to go on a holiday. Gov spending should increase productivity with better infrastructure, education, and health. Consumer borrowing is a different beast. And that increased with the deregulation of the Thatcher/Reagan era. Labour went too centrist and too far in their direction its true. They were too Tory.So, the present problems are all due to Covid and nothing to do with Brexit and the current run of Tory Govs?
So why have all the G7, bar one, recovered to pre Covid levels? Why, since we have all had Covid problems, has the UK such a dire economic forecast compared with other developed economies?Yes. Truss made no mistakes at all. The Labour party was wrong to kick her out of office.
Oh? What? It wasnt just Labour that thought she was a flake? The damage she did was cut short. Largely we are recovering from that. But the longer term reputational hit to the UK? Will investors look at us a stable economy in the future? Even the well known Brexiteer Rattycliff has set up factory for his new car in France. The pet economist of Brexit, Minford, was right about industry falling in the UK after Brexit. (Many people think thats a bad thing though)
None of this is because or about Brexit, Covid, or whomever happens to be in government right now.
ALL of this is about the Western combined citizenry being totally stupid in what has already occured right before their collective eyes, without it making a single jot difference to the way they think about our “Establishment”, or prevent them from voting for yet more “Establishment” people at the next election, if we can even take “Elections” seriously anymore at this point.
Liz Truss was “allowed” to become PM so that the inbound bond market meltdown - could be her administration’s fault, with Sunak keeping his hands clean.
SUNAK was the one that got rid of both Boris and Truss. He’ll get rid of the Tories by the end of next year too, but that’s no good to anyone if Labour doesn’t seriously reform by that point.
The last thing we want is what Germany already have: A Red/Green coalition that’ll cement in place all what is wrong with our country, pretty much infdefinitely…
dozy:
The issue as I’ve said before is you may not make 65 , or if you do only a few years after , I’m 61 & have lost so many mates over the last few years , who have not made 65 or like Johnny h who’s funeral I just attended , 65 & dies of cancer , he spent all his life saving , worrying about tomorrow , always wanted to go on a world cruise , but money was better ( in his opinion ) put away for retirement , Liz his mrs said she’d said to him let’s have something to remember if anything happens , but Johnny said they had to make sure they had money when retired
I’ve piled the money away but after yet another one going too early I went straight down & booked another 2 week hol , as they say you can’t take it with you !!
Easy to sort that “problem” out,
you retire@ 60!!! Lol
Sent from my SM-A125F using Tapatalk
dozy:
The issue as I’ve said before is you may not make 65 , or if you do only a few years after , I’m 61 & have lost so many mates over the last few years , who have not made 65 or like Johnny h who’s funeral I just attended , 65 & dies of cancer , he spent all his life saving , worrying about tomorrow , always wanted to go on a world cruise , but money was better ( in his opinion ) put away for retirement , Liz his mrs said she’d said to him let’s have something to remember if anything happens , but Johnny said they had to make sure they had money when retired
I’ve piled the money away but after yet another one going too early I went straight down & booked another 2 week hol , as they say you can’t take it with you !!
It’s a balancing act though Dozy, yes by all means live for today as tomorrow may never come, but to balance that there’s nothing sadder than the old boy walking around town smelling of ■■■■ and cabbage with all of his belongings in a Tesco bag because he ■■■■■■ it all against the wall.
My old man is in his late nineties and is as fit as a lop. He cycles about five miles a day (although the dementia means he’s up around Edinburgh now!) so statistically I’ve probably got a few years left. Incidentally he’s an ex chief constable and has been retired knocking on 50 years now! How much has that gold plated pension cost the taxpayer?
I don’t like this Establishment-Led brainwashing of the public that is being done, that involves “Pensioners are benefit scroungers” mantra when the vast majority of future POOR pensioners - have paid in all their bloody lives, and have been robbed… are portrayed as being the ones to be vilified by the general public■■?
In the “I’m alright jack” society, everything bad - happens to someone else, not you. This wins over the Conservative voter.
In the “I’m alright jack society” - everything “Good” got stopped, because of “events, dear boy - events!” leaving Labour with not much to campaign on.
We’ve passed the point where we can “vote for a better future” anymore, as are we not now ALL backward looking, to that better age where ordinary working people could get a mortgage on a 3-bedroomed semi, ordinary working people could expect an inflation+ pay rise, and ordinary working people could expect their lives to be saved on a regular basis by the then-working NHS…
I’ve only got three names on my ballot paper this coming Thursday…
Where and how to I cast a “Protest vote” even then, when the three parties cannot have a ■■■ paper fitted between them?
I was in Sussex the other day, and there are “Vote Green” posters up pretty much everywhere.
At least they have a fourth party to vote for… What about us Townies though?
I want to vote against both the Incumbent Government, and the incumbent “Opposition” that has failed to be anything of the sort…
Labour have permitted the Tories to run away with their own deep state agenda here.
In a few short years, it’ll be US that are hanging around on street corners, houses re-possessed, and smelling of discontent rather than “■■■■”.
It is difficult to imagine any kind of “uprising” among a bunch of pension-robbed old gits though…
Winseer:
Where and how to I cast a “Protest vote” even then, when the three parties cannot have a ■■■ paper fitted between them?
Just…
Get your ballot paper and wipe your bottom with it (pop it in a small sealed plastic bag for health regs). That’s a protest vote.
I got auto-enrolled sometime in very late 2020, checked earlier this year and the total nominal value was down about 4%. In other words I could’ve set aside the £30 or whatever they’re taking, put it in a jar every week and today I would have more than what I have in the pension fund. This doesn’t take into account the £20 or so per week the employer contributes though so technically I’d have less but my ‘‘return’’ would be better (inflation aside we’re talking nominal terms here). I’ve no idea how they plan to reach their target for the future as they’re now so deep in the hole they’d have to make unrealistic returns over the next years just to get even let alone increase it significantly.
… posted to wrong thread… so removed. 
Winseer:
I don’t like this Establishment-Led brainwashing of the public that is being done, that involves “Pensioners are benefit scroungers” mantra when the vast majority of future POOR pensioners - have paid in all their bloody lives, and have been robbed… are portrayed as being the ones to be vilified by the general public■■?In the “I’m alright jack” society, everything bad - happens to someone else, not you. This wins over the Conservative voter.
In the “I’m alright jack society” - everything “Good” got stopped, because of “events, dear boy - events!” leaving Labour with not much to campaign on.We’ve passed the point where we can “vote for a better future” anymore, as are we not now ALL backward looking, to that better age where ordinary working people could get a mortgage on a 3-bedroomed semi, ordinary working people could expect an inflation+ pay rise, and ordinary working people could expect their lives to be saved on a regular basis by the then-working NHS…
I’ve only got three names on my ballot paper this coming Thursday…
Where and how to I cast a “Protest vote” even then, when the three parties cannot have a ■■■ paper fitted between them?I was in Sussex the other day, and there are “Vote Green” posters up pretty much everywhere.
At least they have a fourth party to vote for… What about us Townies though?I want to vote against both the Incumbent Government, and the incumbent “Opposition” that has failed to be anything of the sort…
Labour have permitted the Tories to run away with their own deep state agenda here.In a few short years, it’ll be US that are hanging around on street corners, houses re-possessed, and smelling of discontent rather than “■■■■”.
It is difficult to imagine any kind of “uprising” among a bunch of pension-robbed old gits though…
To lodge a protest vote you spoil your ballot paper by expessing your opinion and if desired hatred for the party and why. Spoiled ballot papers are shown to the candidates so they get to read your views.
Yes,absolute kicking,down around 75%, however,no one else to blame it’s in a sipp,first year I had it,trebled the amount I paid in from three work place pensions, second year doubled again,then Russia/Ukraine war,got high risk but also previously high return in Russian based miner,I’m down but not out,assets still there,up for sale so still a ,slim ,chance of serious money
ETS:
I’ve no idea how they plan to reach their target for the future as they’re now so deep in the hole they’d have to make unrealistic returns over the next years just to get even let alone increase it significantly.
They don’t have a “target” they are just defined contributions i.e. they will put in what they say, but what you get out is anyone’s guess.