FIRE v London

June 2021 – Alpha, Beta and Delta

2021-07-042021-07-04 FIRE v London3 Comments

June saw the return of Covid in a big way for London and the UK.

While in much of Europe/USA, a covid case is now a rarity, in the UK case numbers are up dramatically – 20-fold in my part of London for instance (see graph below). The Delta variant now accounts for >90% of the cases and, wow, does it spread easily. Other countries, notably Australia, will almost certainly have some of this to come – but you hear it from London first.

*Cases reported in my area by the Zoe app*

The UK is aiming to outrun the Delta variant by vaccinating. The complication with this plan is that you need two jabs to have even a hope of avoiding Delta, and if you have AstraZeneca than your hope is only a 60% hope even with 2 jabs. A virus with an underlying reproductive factor of 8 laughs at protection of only 60% – reducing 8 by 60% leaves the Delta variant with the same reproductive ratio as the original Covid-19 variant.

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May 2021 – a sterling month

2021-06-04 FIRE v London1 Comment

May sucked, as an experience.

The weather sucked. The most miserable May on UK record, or some such.

I was working very hard, with a couple of crises/dramas to deal with at work.

So I had barely any time to pay attention to the markets. About the most noticeable thing was that the pound clipped above $1.40 and stayed there. For me with a high (~50%) USA weighting, the forex movement dominates the market returns – leaving my benchmark markets, in GBP, down about 0.6% on the month.

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Margin loans in the UK – my experience

2021-05-032025-02-04 FIRE v London16 Comments

Everybody’s familiar with the concept of a mortgage, right? But hardly anybody has heard of ‘margin loans’. It turns out that margin loans provide another way to borrow money, one whose advantages mean that wealthy investors tend to prefer them to mortgages, and which is more accessible than you might think.

The UK has the most sophisticated financial services industry in Europe. And in some respects, one of the most sophisticated in the world. But in one area it clearly lags the USA – the stock market. Whether it comes to the size of the stock market, the % of society who own stocks/shares, or the number of stockbrokers – we in the UK are a long way behind our transatlantic cousins.

In the UK, even the concept of ‘margin loans’ would leave financially savvy stockmarket pundits scratching their head. Perhaps a couple of them – www.Monevator.com comments readers I’m sure – would cross-reference to the excellent movie ‘Margin Call‘, starring Kevin Spacey, Demi Moore and Jeremy Irons, but that movie’s lack of success in the UK tells you what you need to know about the wider understanding of ‘margin lending’ in the UK.

As regular readers of this blog know, I am a member of that rare and unusual species – a UK user of margin loans. This page is to serve as some form of introduction to the concept for UK/European readers, as well as summarising some of my experiences and linking to further reading.

What is a margin loan?

Loans generally come in two shapes/sizes – secured loans, and unsecured loans. Secured loans – where the lender has some form of collateral – are cheaper, reflecting the lower risk that the lender is exposed to.

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