Credit deflation and the reflation cycle to come (part 2)

[Harley]

5 hours ago, Cattle Prod said:

Weyerhauser for equity ownership and divis. They own many, many trees. Not sure how the balance sheet is mind you.

I passed on it and all its cohort except one a few months back  Time to take another look and maybe get a less fussy, or hold my ground and wait.

 

[Yadda yadda yadda]

45 minutes ago, spygirl said:

Investors sceptical over Bank of England’s QE programme

FT survey finds big players in bond market think plan is attempt to finance government deficit

https://www.ft.com/content/f92b6c67-15ef-460f-8655-e458f2fe2487

The Bank of England is on course for a difficult 2021, after a Financial Times survey found investors believe the central bank’s quantitative easing programme is a thinly veiled attempt to finance the government’s deficit to keep its borrowing costs down.

The BoE maintains that its QE programme is calibrated to keep inflation close to its 2 per cent target. Andrew Bailey, the central bank’s governor, said in November: “We do not . . . set a level of quantitative easing and asset purchases in any way related to what the government is going to borrow.”

But investors are convinced the BoE bought an additional £450bn of gilts during the Covid-19 crisis in order to ease the government’s huge programme of borrowing by keeping debt servicing costs at rock bottom.

...

In particular, most said they thought the scale of BoE bond buying in the current crisis had been calibrated to absorb the flood of extra bonds sold this year, suggesting they believe the central bank is financing the government’s borrowing. “In this extraordinary year of gilt supply, the BoE has been the dominant buyer,” said Matthew Amis, of Aberdeen Standard Investments. “Without this significant support, bond yields would have risen significantly. Very simply, the gilt market could not have taken down the record £485bn supplied by the Debt Management Office to the market this year.”

 

Pants on fire!

 

Looking at that graph the BoE has QEd more cash than the Government has borrowed since May.

[jamtomorrow]

46 minutes ago, Sugarlips said:

as an aside does anyone like Lithium as a little gamble, the last price breakout was a while after the silver one and it’s not moved much recently, yet. I appreciate battery tech is going to keep evolving but it’s an essential component presently.

I had a sniff around about a year ago along similar lines and came to the conclusion that supply side is pretty elastic, which means it's unlikely to do what we expect, say, oil to do i.e. hold high prices for long periods because supply is inelastic and laggy.

Mothballing of Wodgina is a case in point: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-11-01/wodgina-lithium-project-mothballed-and-workers-to-lose-jobs/11663726

Wodgina capacity on its own is a sword of damacles over the market, and Albemarle have a couple of existing projects running at idle waiting for demand to pick up: https://www.mining.com/albemarle-ahead-with-expansions-despite-lithium-market-weakness/

Basically, it looks like everyone knows there's a wall of EV demand coming for lithium, but there's a corresponding wall of supply capacity front-running the demand.

DYOR of course (and I'd be interested to hear if you find a counter-narrative)

[Sugarlips]

14 minutes ago, jamtomorrow said:

I had a sniff around about a year ago along similar lines and came to the conclusion that supply side is pretty elastic, which means it's unlikely to do what we expect, say, oil to do i.e. hold high prices for long periods because supply is inelastic and laggy.

Mothballing of Wodgina is a case in point: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-11-01/wodgina-lithium-project-mothballed-and-workers-to-lose-jobs/11663726

Wodgina capacity on its own is a sword of damacles over the market, and Albemarle have a couple of existing projects running at idle waiting for demand to pick up: https://www.mining.com/albemarle-ahead-with-expansions-despite-lithium-market-weakness/

Basically, it looks like everyone knows there's a wall of EV demand coming for lithium, but there's a corresponding wall of supply capacity front-running the demand.

DYOR of course (and I'd be interested to hear if you find a counter-narrative)

Great perspective thanks, could the same argument be offered for silver or iron ore etc? Neither are genuinely scarce so rising demand can be met indefinitely if the price is right.

id be curious what drove the Lithium price in the mid teens, it really moved there for a while.

[Harley]

1 hour ago, spygirl said:

But investors are convinced the BoE bought an additional £450bn of gilts during the Covid-19 crisis in order to ease the government’s huge programme of borrowing by keeping debt servicing costs at rock bottom.

Of course they are as they've got eff all ability to "configure" inflation or anything else.  Hubris for the younguns and plain old smoke blowing for the oldies.

[Loki]

14 minutes ago, Sugarlips said:

Great perspective thanks, could the same argument be offered for silver or iron ore etc? Neither are genuinely scarce so rising demand can be met indefinitely if the price is right.

 

Demand met with supply, but at what price? 

[Harley]

6 hours ago, DurhamBorn said:

Joking apart it has crossed my mind for us to set up a Ltd company,buy some shit land and plant a load of trees.

I planted c.400 (i.e. really not that many!) a while back.  Doing fine but need thining out!  More amenity and shelter belt than for cropping but plan on adding a few Christmas trees this year, although bagged a nice reduced £9.99 one this year so why bother (ah yes, inflation!).

[Sugarlips]

1 minute ago, Loki said:

Demand met with supply, but at what price? 

Circular isn’t it! I’m going to dip a toe in the name of diversifying, can’t hurt to be spread across as many base resources as possible in these bizarre times..

[Loki]

Just having a read of Dave H's latest twitter post, have to admit I folded up laughing at this reply.  Looks like others saw the funny side too

 

 

[Harley]

1 hour ago, Sugarlips said:

Another interesting suggestion however it’s gone from $15 to $33 this year has a 2% yield and a P/e of 50, still a great investment today?

Nice to hear someone say that.  Plus some have weakish financials (e.g. debt).

[JMD]

11 hours ago, Cattle Prod said:

There will be very little North Sea revenue from now on, that ship has sailed (I wish someone would tell the Scots though). Like any business, you can offset your losses, and there has been so much loss in the last few years, much of the remaining revenue will come in tax free. The only ones paying tax at the moment are the majors who have had good cashflow throughout and haven't lost money. But they are selling their portfolios, as margins get thinner.

Then someone like Chrysoar buys up the major's assets. Then they buy Premier Oil, with around $4bn of accumulated tax losses. Hey presto! Tax free income for those old majors assets, nothing for HM revenue. The North Sea will be wound down in this fashion, with a trickle of taxes coming from major-run long life assets like Clair and Elgin-Franklin. Then comes decommissioning where you can write off much of that cost against tax elsewhere too. 

When some journalist finally joins the dots on this (it's all public domain) there will be uproar, but the govt is trying to keep the jobs going as long as possible, while retaining some energy security. People forget that oil and gas companies can and will just move to another jurisdiction if they don't like the Ts and Cs any more. So governments tend to improve the terms as the industry matures. The time to haul in the tax is in the middle of the production curve, and they blew that on benefits. The Scots got their fair share of that.

As for pandas, aren't they going extinct due to a lack of sex drive?!

Apologies, I don't think I was clear, I was really referring only to the off shore wind that was mentioned in the original post article. I did mention the oil companies but only because they will be the probable owners of the wind farms.                                                                                                                                                                              Interesting that you say the depletion of North sea oil has been known for some time. I'm sure a big part of Alex Salmond's economic case for Scottish independence relied upon that oil!! I know he's a politician but how could a former 'senior oil executive' (as we were repeatedly told by the media) make such a school boy error? ...Rhetorical Question of course.

[JMD]

12 hours ago, Harley said:

Indeed.  As I often say, political economy, but I never truly expected (internalised) this intensity when first really starting to say it with earnest last year.  Sometimes hard to know which is the head and which the tail so yes, both linked and relevant.  Plandemic or whatever, it is the new blatantness and intensity that are key.  2021 is the year of financial repression via regulation, tax, and every other lever.  I repeat this to myself over and over again and yet still have so much left undone, a rabbit in the headlights, a continual failure to fully internalise what is going on and going to happen, always on the back foot.  The worse kind of battle, one where you think this might be the day.

Sobering post Harley given your background. My use of the term 'plandemic' is lazy - I freely admit I don't know what I mean by it - only that 'something' doesn't look/sound/smell right. But I refuse to believe, given the massive money spending, public on side/good will, etc, how the government has screwed up so badly. And not just ours but all governments. It can't be due to mass incompetence, ok many would disagree with me on that point I'm sure. Everything is crazy - The only way I have managed to keep my own sanity is too reflect on all the madness happening around through the lens of Howe's Fourth Turning. Things like institutional decay, and maybe the assumtion that those at the top are aware of an impending required reset would kinda explain the willful neglect being inflicted upon Western nations. ...The weird thing is I actually sleep better thinking this... it doesn't bring closure, but maybe a form of strange serenity, sick or what - hope it's not a sign of early onset Stockholm Syndrome!!

[JMD]

10 hours ago, sancho panza said:

the reality is that they could finish this pandemic by limitng PCR cycles to 15.Like you say,it's the obvious get out of jail card and then we go back to people dying of flu/pneumonia.

I don't think our political class are bright enough to pre empt this and are far more likely to be reacting and choosing the easiest option out of whatever mess they've got themselves into.The western debt situation is the stuff of utter stupidity and short sightedness.There's no way even people as stupid and irresponsible as our political class would have gone down that road if they'd understood the consequences.

David Hunter's rather dark warning about what comes after he's dead has stayed with me ever since I first heard him utter it.I do think think we're lumbering into a crisis that will threaten modern society as we know it.

SP I don't follow why flu cases would increase, or the get out of jail point. Do all nations use the same PCR test sensitivity (15?)? If they don't, I understad that this would presumably register different infection rates/covid cases - and that the stats would then change for the better and the R rate would fall. That's good for massaging the stats. However changing the PCR test scale wouldn't change the number of seriously ill covid patients from entering hospital, and where their high viral infection level would be correctly measured/diagnosed. If these patients died, it would surely be recorded as a covid death. Have I misunderstood you? Why would the number of flu cases increase? 

[Rave]

16 hours ago, JMD said:

(i note that Neil Ferguson is still working for the government, despite having to resign last year for breaking lock-down rules, he's even interviewed on tv these days. So Ferguson's transgression has been forgiven but Cummings will never be... curious thing that!?) 

Ferguson popped over a couple of miles to shag his lover while having no reason to think that either of them had covid. Cummings drove 2/3rds the length of the country precisely because he (correctly, as it turned out) thought he did have covid.

Ferguson immediately apologised and resigned as he knew his position was untenable. Cummings meanwhile didn't apologise and didn't resign. He held on to his job for another six months until, despite the fact that he's apparently the greatest political strategist since Machiavelli, he lost an internal power struggle with the Prime Minister's dippy young girlfriend.

But yeah, it's definitely Cummings that has been badly treated, and whom we should all feel sorry for.

[Barnsey]

Dems look like they've possibly just about clinched both Senate seats, 10 yr popped it's head above 1%. If true, we're entering interesting territory. $2000 cheques going out to retail investors, insiders rotate out heavily realising implications of complete Democrat control? Rotation into growth? Classic pump and dump? Then Chinese devalue Yuan?

[nirvana]

1 hour ago, Barnsey said:

Dems look like they've possibly just about clinched both Senate seats, 10 yr popped it's head above 1%. If true, we're entering interesting territory. $2000 cheques going out to retail investors, insiders rotate out heavily realising implications of complete Democrat control? Rotation into growth? Classic pump and dump? Then Chinese devalue Yuan?

DXY hitting the skids again.....good for Oilies, maybe not so good for the Gold bugs? 

Do the Chinkies need to devalue with Biden in their back pocket?

[Barnsey]

11 minutes ago, 5min OCD speculator said:

DXY hitting the skids again.....good for Oilies, maybe not so good for the Gold bugs? 

Do the Chinkies need to devalue with Biden in their back pocket?

Albert Edwards calling for a deflationary bust due to spread of new strain in US, Dave Hunter calling for deflationary bust due to policy mistakes, Henrik Zeberg calling for deflationary bust due to strong $. All others calling for inflation as the consensus trade. Thing is, it's the fear of inflation that creates inflation, thus as the consensus trade it can indeed become a self fulfilling prophecy.

[AWW]

3 hours ago, Rave said:

Ferguson / Cummings stuff 

You can make arguments for both of them. Cummings had an apparently genuine childcare issue. Ferguson just wanted to get his cock wet. Cummings didn't tell us all that we needed to lock down. Ferguson did. Personally, I don't think either of them did anything particularly heinous, but Ferguson of course has rank hypocrisy completely against him.

Now, about that nice Margaret Ferrier...

Back on topic, Bitcoin vs gold. FWIW, I think it unlikely that BTC has taken much money at all out of gold. Gold bugs aren't going to buy BTC, and BTC buyers (certainly the ones I know) would never consider gold - for many, BTC is their only investment, and shares are seen as "too risky" (except Tesla).

They've had a good 2020, to be fair to them.

[Barnsey]

U.K. Businesses Enter New Lockdown With Dwindling Cashflows

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-01-05/u-k-businesses-enter-new-lockdown-with-dwindling-cashflows

“Economic activity was strikingly downbeat in the final quarter of 2020,” said Suren Thiru, head of economics at the BCC. “A new national lockdown means that a significant double-dip recession in the first quarter of this year is looking increasingly likely.”

[dnb24]

7 hours ago, JMD said:

SP I don't follow why flu cases would increase, or the get out of jail point. Do all nations use the same PCR test sensitivity (15?)? If they don't, I understad that this would presumably register different infection rates/covid cases - and that the stats would then change for the better and the R rate would fall. That's good for massaging the stats. However changing the PCR test scale wouldn't change the number of seriously ill covid patients from entering hospital, and where their high viral infection level would be correctly measured/diagnosed. If these patients died, it would surely be recorded as a covid death. Have I misunderstood you? Why would the number of flu cases increase? 

My understanding on this is that current PCR testing uses CTs of over 35- therefore picks up dead viral rna(different countries use different CTs- you can see when Spain and Belgium reduced their CTs with a corresponding dip in positives back in November iirc). Therefore a huge proportion of people attending hospital are testing positive- even though they probably only have traces/dead rna of virus in their mucus membranes. This is reflected in the pneumonia/flu death stats- which have reduced by circa 90% in this last year- ergo- sars coV-2 is either taking these people earlier than flu, or it is being misconstrued with flu deaths. Therefore when lateral flow comes in, PCR testing reduces to below 35 cycles (WHO now recommend around 25)- testing will pick up only the true positives- and covid deaths will reduce, flu deaths will go back to normal= covid cured.

[nirvana]

25 minutes ago, Barnsey said:

Albert Edwards calling for a deflationary bust due to spread of new strain in US, Dave Hunter calling for deflationary bust due to policy mistakes, Henrik Zeberg calling for deflationary bust due to strong $. All others calling for inflation as the consensus trade. Thing is, it's the fear of inflation that creates inflation, thus as the consensus trade it can indeed become a self fulfilling prophecy.

yeah so many 'talking heads'......I think this year I'm gonna try and ignore them all and just concentrate on 'FED policy and roadmap'......Chinkie exports running hot, they don't need to devalue methinks but hey ho don't overthink it, trade them lines 

 

[ThoughtCriminal]

15 hours ago, DurhamBorn said:

Joking apart it has crossed my mind for us to set up a Ltd company,buy some shit land and plant a load of trees.

Why not in Durham? Cheap as chips for land. 

[ThoughtCriminal]

4 hours ago, Rave said:

Ferguson popped over a couple of miles to shag his lover while having no reason to think that either of them had covid. Cummings drove 2/3rds the length of the country precisely because he (correctly, as it turned out) thought he did have covid.

Ferguson immediately apologised and resigned as he knew his position was untenable. Cummings meanwhile didn't apologise and didn't resign. He held on to his job for another six months until, despite the fact that he's apparently the greatest political strategist since Machiavelli, he lost an internal power struggle with the Prime Minister's dippy young girlfriend.

But yeah, it's definitely Cummings that has been badly treated, and whom we should all feel sorry for.

You mean Ferguson who resigned in name only but stayed in place despite government assurances he was gone? 

 

Dont piss down my leg and tell me it's raining. 

[spygirl]

3 minutes ago, Cattle Prod said:

Here it is, and I don't think it's a thread derail. As bonkers as it is, possibly the biggest factor affecting macro investment right now is the number of PCR cycles being used by the lunatics in charge of the asylum:

https://drmalcolmkendrick.org/2020/12/30/what-is-left-to-say/

 

30th December 2020

I have not written much about COVID19 recently. What can be said? In my opinion the world has simply gone bonkers. The best description can be found in Dante’s Inferno, written many hundreds of years ago.

In it, Dante describes the outcasts, who took no side in the rebellion of angels. They live in the vestibule. Not in heaven, not in hell, forever unclassified. They reside on the shores of the Acheron. Naked and futile, they race around through a hellish mist in eternal pursuit of an elusive, wavering banner, symbolic of their pursuit of ever-shifting self-interest.

I find this description of the desperate pursuit of an elusive wavering banner rings rather true. This, it seems, is pretty much the place we have arrived at. Which banner have you decided to follow?

The ‘COVID19 s the most terrible infection ever, and we must do everything in our power to stop it, whatever the cost’ banner.

Or the ‘What on earth are we doing? This is no worse than a bad flu, and we are destroying the world economy, stripping away basic human rights and killing more people than we are saving’ banner.

There may be others.

Between these two, main, completely incompatible positions, lies the truth. It is in pretty poor shape. It has been crushed, and bent out of shape, smashed, and left as a broken heap in the corner. I search where I can, to find the fragments, in an attempt to bring together a picture that makes some kind of sense.

But what to believe? Who to believe?

I feel somewhat like Rene Descartes. In order to find the ineluctable truth he scraped everything away until he was left with ‘Cogito, ergo sum’. ‘I think, therefore I am.’

I have stripped away at the accuracy of PCR COVID19 testing. I found myself left with nothing I could make any sense of. I hacked down to establish the way that COVID19 deaths are recorded. All I found were assumptions and difficulties.

Did someone die with COVID19, of COVID19 – or did it have absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with COVID19? Who knows? I certainly don’t, and I wrote some of the death certificates myself.

Have we overestimated deaths, or underestimated deaths? I do not know … and so it goes on.

So, what do I know? I know that COVID19 exists – or I am as certain of this as I can be. Was it a natural mutation from a bat, or was it created in a laboratory? Well, I suppose it doesn’t really matter. It’s here, and there is no chance that any Government, anywhere, would ever admit responsibility for creating the damned thing. So, we will never know. If you asked me to bet, I would say it was created in a lab, then escaped by accident.

Is it deadlier than influenza? Well, it is certainly deadlier than some strains of influenza. Indeed, most strains. However, Spanish flu was estimated to have killed fifty million, when the world’s population was about a fifth of what it is now. So, COVID19 is definitely less deadly than that one. About as deadly as the influenzas of 1957 and 1967. Probably.

Will it mutate into something worse? Who knows.

Will the current vaccines work on mutated strains? Who knows.

Can it be transmitted by asymptomatic carriers? Who knows.

How effective are the current vaccines going to be? Who knows.

What are we left with?

At the beginning, I kept relatively quiet on how deadly COVID19 would prove to be. Because I didn’t know. The figures raged up and down. The infection fatality rate become a battle scene, with warriors lined up on either side to defend their positions.

I even got attacked by factcheckers, the self-appointed know-it-alls who are, it seems, capable of judging on all matters of scientific dispute. Truly, the Gods have descended to live amongst us. Those who can determine what is true, and what is not. No need for any further clinical trials, or any more scientific studies of any sort, ever. We just need to ask the Fact Checkers for the answer, to any given question.

Anyway, it appeared that tens of thousands died in some countries, almost none in others. What I was waiting to see, was the impact on the one outcome that you cannot alter, or fudge. The outcome that is overall mortality i.e. the chances of dying, of anything.

I did this because, when it comes to recording deaths from a specific illness, things can go in and out of fashion. A couple of years ago I looked at deaths from sepsis. At one time this was a condition of far lower priority. Doctors didn’t routinely search for it, or routinely record it, on death certificates.

Sepsis is an infection that gets into the blood, toxins are released, and people die. Everyone knew it happened. Or at least I hope they did.

Then, all of a sudden, there was a gigantic push to look for it more diligently, diagnose it more, treat it better. I think this was generally a good thing. Sepsis is eminently treatable, if you think to look for it, and lives can be saved. We now have initiatives like ‘Sepsis six’ and warnings that pop up on computers. ‘Have you considered sepsis,’ and suchlike. I love it … not. Because I do not love being told how to think, and do my job, by a computer algorithm programmed with ‘zero risk’ as their touchstone. But, hey ho.

In 2013, in the UK, a report was published by the health ombudsman ‘Time to Act – severe sepsis, rapid diagnosis and treatment saves lives.’ As the report stated.

‘Sepsis is a more common reason for hospital admission than heart attack – and has a higher mortality.’ The UK Sepsis Trust ¹

That last statement is somewhat disingenuous, as many people with sepsis are very elderly, often with multiple morbidities, and suchlike. They were probably going to die, shortly, from something else.

Anyway. With all this activity, with all this increased sepsis recognition and treatment, you would expect the rate of deaths from sepsis to fall. It did not. The rate has gone up, by around 30% since 2013. Does this mean there is far more sepsis going about? Or, that it is just more often written on death certificates? I suggest the latter. I use this example, simply to make it clear that even the cause of death written on a death certificate is far from rock solid evidence.

With COVID19, this is a massive problem. In the UK, and several other countries if you have had a COVID19 positive test (which may, or may not, be accurate) and you die within twenty-eight days of that positive test, you will be recorded as a COVID19 death. I do not know much for sure about COVID19, but I do know that is just complete nonsense.

There are so many cases where – even if the COVID19 test was accurate – COVID19 would have had nothing whatsoever to do with the death. Another thing known, or at least we probably know, is that the vast majority of people who die had many other things wrong with them.

In the US, the Centre of Disease Control (CDC) found that ninety-four per cent of people who died of COVID19 ‘related deaths’ had other significant diseases (co-morbidities) ².  This ninety-four per-cent figures would only be the co-morbidities that were known about – who knows what lurked beneath? Especially as people stopped doing post-mortems (i.e., autopsies in the US).

So yes, they had COVID19 (or at least they had a positive test – which may not be the same thing), but they were often very old, and already severely ill. Using an extreme example, someone with terminal cancer who is a week from death, catches COVID19 in hospital, and dies. What killed them? The statistics say COVID19. I say, bollocks.

When I started in medicine, ‘bronchopneumonia’ (a bad chest infection) used to be known as the ‘old man’s friend.’ For those who were very old, and frail, often demented, lying in care homes, often incontinent, a chest infection represented a reasonably painless way to die.

Very often we would not actively treat it, instead we allowed for a peaceful death. Indeed, this still happens. Less so now, as someone, somewhere, often a relative from a country far, far, away – who has not visited for years – is far more likely to sue you.

Did they really die of bronchopneumonia? You could argue yes, you could argue no. Yes, it was the thing that finally pushed them over the edge. No, they were already slowly dying as their body gave out. In the end, what does anyone actually die of? My Scottish grannie, who lived to one hundred and two, used to say ‘they die frae want of breath.’ Entirely accurate, but, alas, also completely useless.

So, what you need to do, is look beyond what is written on death certificates. You need to look at what is happening to the overall mortality. Whilst you can argue endlessly, pointlessly, about specific causes of death. What you cannot argue about is whether or not someone is alive, or dead. Even I usually get this one right. No pulse, no breathing, no reaction of the pupils to light, no response to pain… and suchlike. Yup, dead. Now… what they die of? Um… let me think.

Thus, I have tended to look to EuroMOMO. The European Mortality Monitoring project. As they say, of themselves:

‘The overall objective of the original European Mortality Monitoring Project was to design a routine public health mortality monitoring system aimed at detecting and measuring, on a real-time basis, excess number of deaths related to influenza and other possible public health threats across participating European Countries.

Mortality is a basic indicator of health. Therefore, understanding its epidemiology is fundamental for effective public health planning and action.

Mortality monitoring becomes pivotal during influenza or other pandemics for several reasons. In a severe pandemic, mortality monitoring can be a robust way to monitor the pandemics progression and its public health impact when other systems are failing, due to an overburdened health care sector. Decision makers will require data on the pandemics impact and on deaths by age and geographical area in various stages of the pandemic. Mortality monitoring can provide such estimates, which will be important to guide and prioritize health service response and decision-making, i.e. use of antivirals and vaccines.’ ³  

Here are the data that you can therefore, pretty much, fully rely on. It is where I go to see what is really happening across Europe. Not all of Europe, as some countries do not participate. However, there are more than enough, to get a good picture. It encompasses key countries such as Spain, Italy, the UK (split into four separate countries), Sweden and suchlike.

Here is the graph of overall mortality for all ages, in all countries. The graph starts at the beginning of 2017 and carries on to almost the end of 2020.

As you can see, in each winter there is an increase in deaths. In 2020, nothing much happened at the start of the year, then we had – what must have been – the COVID19 spike. The tall pointy bit around week 15.

It started in late March and was pretty much finished by mid-May. Now, we are in winter, and the usual winter spike appears. It seems to be around the same size as winter 2017/18. It also seems to have passed the peak and is now falling. But it could jump up again. [The figures in the most recent weeks can always be a bit inaccurate, as it can take some time for all the data to arrive]

Two things stand out. First, there was an obvious ‘COVID19 spike’. Second, what we are seeing at present does not differ greatly from previous years. The normal winter spike in deaths.

If we split this down into individual countries, this reasonably clear pattern falls apart.

Here are the figures from England

Unlike the first graph, the scale on the left is not absolute numbers. It is a thing called the Z-score. Which means standard deviation from the mean. Sorry, maths. If the Z-score goes above five, this means something significant is happening. The red, upper, dotted line is Z > 5. As you can see, despite the howls of anguish from England about COVID19 overwhelming the country, we are really not seeing much at all.

What of Sweden, that pariah country? They did not fully lock-down, the irresponsible fools (all they did was follow WHO guidance – by the way), and we are now told they are suffering terribly, they should have enforced far more rigid lockdown, their ‘experiment’ failed etc. etc. COVID19 shall have its vengeance. Or to quote Arnie – I’ll be back.

As you can see, nothing much happening in Sweden either.

Then, if you look further, there are anomalies all over the place. Northern Ireland, which is part of the UK, and did exactly the same things as the rest of the UK with regard to lockdown, masks etc. At least it did in the earlier part of the year. However, it shows a completely different pattern to England. Or, to be fully accurate, it shows no pattern at all. No waves, and nobody drowning.

What of Slovenia?

As you can see absolutely nothing happened earlier in the year in Slovenia. Now, it has the biggest spike of all – apart from, maybe, Switzerland. Earlier in the year it was held up as a great example of how brilliantly effective masks were. Now… you don’t hear so much about masks. Maybe masks only work in months beginning with M. [Maybe, whisper it, they don’t work at all].

So, what have I learned from euroMOMO? First that it appears to have made absolutely no difference if a country locked down hard, and early, or did not. Everyone points at Norway and Finland as examples of great and early government action, and how wonderful everything would have been if we had done the same.

Well, look up at Northern Ireland. Then look at Finland

Spot the difference. There is none.

Of course, much of the most heated debate surrounded what happened during the so-called first wave. Who dealt with it well, or badly. Now, everyone in Europe is doing much the same things. Lockdown, restrictions on travel, restrictions on meeting other people, everyone wearing masks, etc. etc. Yet some countries are having a new wave, and others are not.

There is a special prize for anyone who can match up the severity of restrictions in various countries, to the Z-score. I say this, because no correlation exists.

So, again, what have I learned about COVID19? I learned that all Governments are floundering about, all claiming to have exerted some sort of control over this disease and ignoring all evidence to the contrary. In truth, they have achieved nothing. As restrictions and lockdowns have become more severe, in many cases the number of infections has simply risen and risen, completely unaffected by anything that has been done.

The official solution is, of course, more restrictions. ‘We just haven’t restricted people enough!’ Sigh. When something doesn’t work, the answer is not to keep doing it with even greater fervour. The real answer is to stop doing it and try something else instead.

I have also learned that, in most countries, COVID19 appears to be seasonal. It went away – everywhere – in the summer. It came back in the autumn/winter, as various viruses do.

On its return is has been, generally, far less deadly. Much you would expect. The most vulnerable died on first exposure, and far fewer people had any resistance to it, at all. Now, a number of people do have some immunity, and may of the vulnerable are already dead.

Which means that, in this so-called second wave COVID19 is of no greater an issue than a moderately bad flu season.

If I were to recommend actions. I would recommend that we stop testing – unless someone is admitted to hospital and is seriously ill. Mass testing is simply causing mass panic and achieves absolutely nothing. At great cost. We should also just get on with our lives as before. We should just vaccinate those at greatest risk of dying, the elderly and vulnerable, and put this rather embarrassing episode of mad banner waving behind us.

Hopefully, in time, we will learn something. Which is that we should not, ever, run about panicking, following the madly waved banners… ever again. However, I suspect that we will. This pandemic is going to be a model for all mass panicking stupidity in the future. Because to do otherwise, would be to admit that we made a pig’s ear of it this time. Far too many powerful reputations at stake to allow that.

1: https://www.ombudsman.org.uk/sites/default/files/Time_to_act_report.pdf

2: https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nvss/vsrr/covid_weekly/index.htm?fbclid=IwAR3-wrg3tTKK5-9tOHPGAHWFVO3DfslkJ0KsDEPQpWmPbKtp6EsoVV2Qs1Q&_ga=2.83596054.1497558416.1598967201-386365132.1598967194#Comorbidities

3: https://www.euromomo.eu/about-us/history/

 

 

Finland are grumpy drunks who live in an freezing country.

They dont go out n mix from Oct -> April.

[Democorruptcy]

10 hours ago, Yadda yadda yadda said:

Looking at that graph the BoE has QEd more cash than the Government has borrowed since May.

I've posted about "Ways and Means" before. 

(Edit to add, my other link here is a better explanation than the one quoted below)

April:

Quote

 

The Bank of England (BoE) has agreed temporarily to finance government borrowing in response to COVID-19 if funds cannot immediately be raised from debt markets, reviving a measure last used to any large degree during the 2008 financial crisis.

Britain’s government typically borrows money direct from markets through bond issuance, and this week financial markets showed a strong appetite to fund more than 10 billion pounds ($12.4 billion) of government bonds, some at record-low yields.

But markets were far choppier last month - before the BoE said it would buy 200 billion pounds of assets, mostly bonds - and Thursday’s announcement gives the BoE scope to finance the government directly.

“As a temporary measure, this will provide a short-term source of additional liquidity to the government if needed to smooth its cashflows and support the orderly functioning of markets, through the period of disruption from Covid-19,” the BoE said in a joint statement with the finance ministry.

The government and BoE said any borrowing from the Ways and Means facility -effectively the government’s overdraft with the BoE - would be repaid by the end of the year.

“The government will continue to use the markets as its primary source of financing, and its response to Covid-19 will be fully funded by additional borrowing through normal debt management operations,” the statement said.

The facility currently has borrowing of 400 million pounds, and usage previously peaked at 19.9 billion pounds in 2008.

BoE Governor Andrew Bailey has previously said that the BoE would not engage in ‘monetary financing’ - the permanent funding of government spending, linked to hyperinflation in post World War One Germany and more recently in Zimbabwe.

https://www.cnbc.com/2020/04/09/bank-of-england-to-temporarily-finance-uk-government-spending.html