What's going to collapse next...

[Odarroc]

48 minutes ago, sancho panza said:

No worries.Barnsey has made some good pooints about how people started out with super attractive Northern Rock mortgages and then a few years later were getting repoed by the bad bank or whatever it was.Mortgage is only as good as the company putting it forward.

Northern Rock very different imo. Most got into trouble after the fixed term ended, then went onto a financial crisis induced 9.9% variable rate, up to 120% mortgages so lots of negative equity to boot. NR got split up into NR & NRAM (Asset management), anyone on 100% mortgage or above siphoned off to NRAM and left to rot. and plenty are still there.

[TheCountOfNowhere]

8 hours ago, Odarroc said:

Northern Rock very different imo. Most got into trouble after the fixed term ended, then went onto a financial crisis induced 9.9% variable rate, up to 120% mortgages so lots of negative equity to boot. NR got split up into NR & NRAM (Asset management), anyone on 100% mortgage or above siphoned off to NRAM and left to rot. and plenty are still there.

Bollocks.... The world ran out of debt 

[spygirl]

20 minutes ago, TheCountOfNowhere said:

Bollocks.... The world ran out of debt 

Yep.

HSBC is funding most of its uk lending with fixed rate, fixed term bonds sold to chinese.

NR was running its loan book on short term debt from the wholesale market. When the debt people got together n compared lending they saw NR had draw down huge amounts from everyone. So they refused to roll over the debt.

If NR had stuck to funding via deposits youd have a still small regional building society. And management on much lower salaries.

At the mo zirp and hsbc vast slush funding is outcomoeting all the othe banks and destroying them.

Nationwide are being cored out as a prime mortgage kender. The prime stuff of 20 years ago is being paid off, leaving the junk lending of 2007+

 

[TheCountOfNowhere]

6 minutes ago, spygirl said:

Yep.

HSBC is funding most of its uk lending with fixed rate, fixed term bonds sold to chinese.

NR was running its loan book on short term debt from the wholesale market. When the debt people got together n compared lending they saw NR had draw down huge amounts from everyone. So they refused to roll over the debt.

If NR had stuck to funding via deposits youd have a still small regional building society. And management on much lower salaries.

At the mo zirp and hsbc vast slush funding is outcomoeting all the othe banks and destroying them.

Nationwide are being cored out as a prime mortgage kender. The prime stuff of 20 years ago is being paid off, leaving the junk lending of 2007+

 

What nw now doing? 

[spygirl]

1 minute ago, TheCountOfNowhere said:

What nw now doing? 

Shitting themselves, by the rate theyve been closing branches in the last year.

[BearyBear]

George on HSBC 

 

[Errol]

13 hours ago, sancho panza said:

I'd get an HSBC mortgage.

Not sure this would help. If HSBC went bankrupt, someone would pick up the mortgage book and you'd end up paying someone else.

[Democorruptcy]

On 19/02/2020 at 18:26, Ash4781b said:

Axminister carpets has collapsed into administration. Unsure if it’s housing market related and or move towards laminates and wood floors. Thought they were high end though.

Wetherspoon must have been their best customer. 950 pubs, each with it's own individual design at £20k to £30k a pop.

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/shortcuts/2016/jan/10/wetherspoons-carpet-tumblr-blog

Is the book a collector's item now Axminster has gone bust?

https://metro.co.uk/2016/10/19/a-175-page-coffee-table-book-dedicated-to-jd-wetherspoons-carpets-exists-6201583/

 

 

[BearyBear]

1 hour ago, Errol said:

Not sure this would help. If HSBC went bankrupt, someone would pick up the mortgage book and you'd end up paying someone else.

Would the new lender be honouring the term & rates..?

Edited February 21, 2020 by BearyBear

[spygirl]

13 hours ago, BearyBear said:

Would the new lender be honouring the term & rates..?

No.

Mortgage books are sold.

Mortgagee put up n shutup. Or move.

[sancho panza]

HSBC.................big profit warning must be looming Q3,poss earlier

https://wolfstreet.com/2020/02/24/hong-kongs-real-estate-housing-office-retail-properties-face-tsunami-like-shocks/

Hong Kong’s Real Estate – Housing, Office & Retail Properties – Face “Tsunami-Like Shocks”

by Nick Corbishley • Feb 24, 2020 • 3 Comments

 

By Nick Corbishley, for WOLF STREET:

The world’s most expensive housing market in terms of affordability for a median-income household is in Hong Kong, which also happens to boast the highest ratio of financial assets to GDP on the planet. That market is under huge strain as it reels from months of virtually non-stop political protest, the ongoing trade war between its two largest trading partners, China, and the U.S., and now the recent arrival of the novel coronavirus.

Values of Class A office buildings in the city fell last year by 7%. It was the first fall since 2008, according to the commercial real estate services firm JLL. Prices of offices as a whole finished the year at their lowest level since the second quarter of 2018. “There was a lot to deal with in 2019, but most importantly the market had been expanding for 11 years,” according to the report. “At a certain point, that had to change.”

The total transaction value of office and retail properties as a whole slumped 12.9% last year to HK$49.6 billion (US$8.9 billion), according to Bloomberg Intelligence. By December, Class A office buildings were registering a 6% vacancy rate, the highest level since April 2010 when the city was struggling with the aftereffects of the Global Financial Crisis. Rents for the segment also fell 3.4% for the year.

But that pales compared to the reverberations being felt across the retail sector, whose sales declined by a mind-watering 19% year-over-year in December, according to Hong Kong’s Census and Statistics Department. Sales of luxury goods — a huge part of Hong Kong’s retail industry — slumped by 37%. Many retailers have gone under or closed stores, resulting in a vacancy rate in core shopping areas of 9%, the highest in five years.

Most of the blame lies with the political crisis that broke out last spring and escalated into a crescendo of violence in the summer that decimated tourist traffic, particularly from mainland China.

Then came the outbreak of Covid-19, which compelled Hong Kong authorities to shut six of the city’s borders with the mainland. Average daily tourist arrivals plunged by 97% to 3,000 in early February from 200,000 a year earlier while many local residents have cut back on all but essential purchases, choking off retail demand.

So spooked are commercial real estate landlords by the scale of the slowdown that some have begun providing rental relief to help their tenants weather the storm. Henderson Land Development, the city’s third-largest developer, offered to slash rent by 60% to help out retailers. Hong Kong’s toy billionaire Francis Choi Chee Ming offered to lop 44% off rents at a 15,000 sq ft space at Plaza 2000 in Causeway Bay, after Prada refused to pay HK$9 million in monthly charges.

Keith Wu Shiu-kee, CEO of Sunlight Real Estate Investment Trust, a unit of Henderson Land Development, believes the impact of the virus on retail sales is likely to be far worse than during the protests, noting that in the second half of 2019 at least some tourists from the mainland were still arriving. He estimates that the plunge in total retail sales this year will be “clearly double-digits,” he said. “Whether it is 30%, 40%, or 50%, remains to be seen.”

Hong Kong’s residential real estate sector has so far weathered the storm slightly better, with home prices dropping 6.1% from a record high in June, according to the Centa-City Leading Index. The index even rebounded slightly in the four weeks through Feb 9 despite coinciding with the outbreak of COVIN-19 and the adoption of increasingly extreme measures by the Chinese and Hong Kong governments to contain its spread.

The effects of the virus are likely to take some time to feed through to property prices and transactions, just as happened with Hong Kong’s political crisis which began last March but didn’t noticeably hit the property market until the summer. Once the effects begin to be felt in the property market, it’s the luxury segment, which depends hugely on demand from mainland China, that will bear the brunt of falling prices, notes JLL.

Hong Kong real estate has been in an almost permanent boom since 2003, when the fallout from the SARS virus drove it to multi-decade lows. Since then, housing prices have risen five-fold, suffering just the briefest of dips in 2008, 2011 and 2015. Today, the prices are beyond the reach of all but the best-heeled residents and investors.

The annual Demographia International Housing Affordability Study, which ranks 92 major markets across the world based on affordability for median-income households, ranks Hong Kong at the top (with a score of 21), far ahead of Number 2, Vancouver, Canada (score of just over 12), and Number 3, Sydney, Australia (score of just under 12).

The chart below shows Hong Kong among metros with populations over 5 million, which excludes Vancouver, San Francisco, and other less-huge hot spots:

These and many other global cities have experienced insane housing bubbles, fueled largely by unprecedented central bank easing, yet over the past 10 years none of them has come even close to stripping Hong Kong of the dubious honor of being the world’s least affordable housing market.

That market is about to have its resilience tested. Prices in the luxury sector could fall by as much as 20% this year, says JLL. Not everyone agrees. According to a Bloomberg article bearing the optimistic title “Hong Kong’s Teflon Home Prices Are Virus Proof,” the fallout for the residential real estate sector is likely to be minimal, at least compared to the fallout for the commercial property sector.

The government is also desperately trying to reassure prospective home buyers and boost market demand by loosening mortgage loan-to-value (LTV) ratio rules. It is also about to unveil its biggest ever budget deficit to protect the city’s economy from “tsunami-like shocks,” according to Finance Secretary Paul Chan Mo-po. Banks are also cutting mortgage borrowers some slack.

But it may not be enough to save the the world’s most expensive property market from a very rocky 2020. As even the Bloomberg article concedes, if there’s “a drastic worsening of the economy”, Hong Kong’s “Teflon houses” may not prove to be quite so virus-proof after all. By Nick Corbishley, for WOLF STREET.

 

[TheCountOfNowhere]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/amp/business-51642664

 

Benny and Frank running out of cash? 

[Wight Flight]

39 minutes ago, TheCountOfNowhere said:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/amp/business-51642664

 

Benny and Frank running out of cash? 

It is more likely their prime customer base has run out of cash.

[spygirl]

33 minutes ago, Wight Flight said:

It is more likely their prime customer base has run out of cash.

More likely its just shit same as everywhere else food.

burgers n pizzas - now thats original!

Congrats to the CEO. Sell sign on legs.

Restaurant Group boss Andy Hornby said: "Our three growth businesses of Wagamama, concessions and pubs are all outperforming their respective markets and have clear potential for further growth.

 

Speaking engagements[edit]

On 18 May 2010 Hornby delivered the British Retail Consortium 2010 Annual Retail Lecture entitled “Retailing…what’s changed with the credit crunch?”^[23] In June of the same year he gave a presentation on “Managing a business after the credit crunch” as part of the Manchester Business School's 2010 Vital Topics lecture series.^[6]

[spygirl]

back to collapsing ...

More finsec:

Insurer Direct Line to cut 800 UK jobs in bid to lower costs

Personal insurance industry faces rising claims expenditure and weak premiums growth

https://www.ft.com/content/2cf54fb2-5892-11ea-abe5-8e03987b7b20

Lloyds to cut 780 UK jobs as lender looks to reduce costs

Bank under pressure from low interest rates and rising competition

https://www.ft.com/content/3e0a1e22-588d-11ea-abe5-8e03987b7b20

 

And whats bad for the finsec is terrible for London/SE.

Even if these jobs are not in the area, the finsec generates huge volumes of work for the legal and finance whatnots in around London/SE

 

[TheCountOfNowhere]

17 minutes ago, spygirl said:

back to collapsing ...

More finsec:

Insurer Direct Line to cut 800 UK jobs in bid to lower costs

Personal insurance industry faces rising claims expenditure and weak premiums growth

https://www.ft.com/content/2cf54fb2-5892-11ea-abe5-8e03987b7b20

Lloyds to cut 780 UK jobs as lender looks to reduce costs

Bank under pressure from low interest rates and rising competition

https://www.ft.com/content/3e0a1e22-588d-11ea-abe5-8e03987b7b20

 

And whats bad for the finsec is terrible for London/SE.

Even if these jobs are not in the area, the finsec generates huge volumes of work for the legal and finance whatnots in around London/SE

 

Ahhhh... The irony

 

[TheCountOfNowhere]

Ted Baker.... 150 head office jobs gone today. 

 

The false economy is falling apart. 

[spygirl]

Brown people's credibility.

Two big stories in FT. Same Day.

The workings of Sanjeev Gupta’s empire

https://www.ft.com/content/5f279604-5719-11ea-a528-dd0f971febbc

See my Gupy/Libey thread.

Total fucked up penny shuffling.

And

NMC Health fires chief after finding bank discrepancies

https://www.ft.com/content/6ff6417a-58c1-11ea-abe5-8e03987b7b20

A joke this go even near AIM never mind the FTYSE. Hopefully EY and sued til they shit blood.

Total cluster fuck of brainless fuckwittery.

Just a total wow on all of this.

Almost identical to Steinhoff

 

[TheCountOfNowhere]

What's goingvto collapse next.... EVERYTHING

[spygirl]

Raise and Save - keeps our sharesToday 06:58

Shareholders can protect their shares buying bonds which pay healthy interest in the proposal
Please visit the web site, take the survey and tell everyone
Open to everyone not just shareholders. www.FundSirius.com

[sancho panza]

anyone been foloowing this one

edit to add jsut seen seen sopys post fromthe top of the page

https://wolfstreet.com/2020/02/29/muddy-waters-short-target-nmc-health-a-ftse-100-company-admits-doctoring-accounts-on-massive-scale-shares-suspended/

On December 17, 2019, short-seller Muddy Waters had targeted the company: “We have serious doubts about the company’s financial statements, including its asset values, cash balance, reported profits, and reported debt levels,” it started out. NMC was engaging in a raft of accounting irregularities, including overpaying investments, materially overstating cash balances, and reporting profit margins that “seem too good to be true.” And it concluded, “We are unsure how deep the rot at NMC goes, but we do not believe that its insiders or financials can be trusted.”

Edited February 29, 2020 by sancho panza

[spygirl]

10 hours ago, sancho panza said:

anyone been foloowing this one

edit to add jsut seen seen sopys post fromthe top of the page

https://wolfstreet.com/2020/02/29/muddy-waters-short-target-nmc-health-a-ftse-100-company-admits-doctoring-accounts-on-massive-scale-shares-suspended/

On December 17, 2019, short-seller Muddy Waters had targeted the company: “We have serious doubts about the company’s financial statements, including its asset values, cash balance, reported profits, and reported debt levels,” it started out. NMC was engaging in a raft of accounting irregularities, including overpaying investments, materially overstating cash balances, and reporting profit margins that “seem too good to be true.” And it concluded, “We are unsure how deep the rot at NMC goes, but we do not believe that its insiders or financials can be trusted.”

Yes.

I thought this was just a crappy company that was pump n dumped on the UK market.

Its turning out to be a more complex, fucked up bit of fuckwittery.

Another nail the UK accounting and city firms.

Its a total scam that should have been found out within a few days ofthe EY looking atthe book.

 

 

 

[spygirl]

NMC Health seeks leniency from lenders amid crisis

FTSE 100 company is scrambling to shore up its finances

https://www.ft.com/content/9f54e9a0-5c5c-11ea-8033-fa40a0d65a98

[spygirl]

TOS site banner ad - AA home loans - get a new kitchen!

Flipped form PE ownership in 2014 @ 250p.

Price today 40p.

A car recovery firm, carrying a almost 3bln of debt, a market cap of 266.43M, wants to lend me money to do up my bathroom.

https://moneyweek.com/517496/how-debt-has-broken-the-breakdown-recovery-business

Fucked.

 

[spygirl]

Intu collapses. Again.

Now to start watching John Whittaker and his bankers/creditors.

https://www.ft.com/content/497be3f0-da7f-11e7-a039-c64b1c09b482

John Whittaker, the 75-year-old billionaire investor at the centre of the £3.4bn all-share offer by Hammerson for rival Intu, has a knack for knowing what the public wants.

After selling his Trafford Centre shopping centre to Intu in 2011, he ended up with more than a quarter of its shares. When Mr Whittaker then took a smaller stake in Hammerson this summer, talk in the market began that a long-rumoured deal could finally be on its way. The Trafford