Whatever it takes to the Solent

Whatever It Takes, went the mantra. And it still is the mantra. The problem is that the mechanism has not permitted Whatever It Takes to be implemented. Economic spirits are ebbing away as the logjam in Europe continues. For a while European decision-making was able to look over the brink and act in time. But it is now behind the curve. Recent days have seen commodity prices start to lose altitude. Even the gold price fell as people remembered that an important underpin for gold investors is fabrication demand which takes a large chunk of newly mined gold each year, with China becoming ever-important. Stand by for huge support funds: the ECB will end up buying many billions, even trillions of sovereign debt while the EFSB will have to be boosted to Euros 2 trillion plus. Maybe there will even be a global bail-out with sovereign wealth funds, China, USA, IMF 'n all. But markets are likely to swoon more first because not enough will be forthcoming ahead of the curve. Banking system threat remains on red alert with the risk of spiral into good quality credit rising. Banks have to refinance an awful lot of debt through 2012 and they will be relying on declining collateral quality to do so. This will push up lending rates in a weakening economy. In the meantime we head to Southampton tomorrow to enroll our son into Uni for the first time. There are milestones in life.... The QSL is from BBC Radio Solent, heard in London in 1996 on AM 999. We are looking forward to sailing the Solent soon.