Suspected bomb found in London

Police have made safe a suspected car bomb in the heart of London.

Officers carried out a controlled explosion after reports of a suspicious vehicle parked in The Haymarket shortly before 0200 BST (0100 GMT).

The trouble with interest-only mortgages

Even if you can get an impossibly low interest rate (Rl) and unbelievable multiples (Mh) so that you can afford the half million or so for that trendy, ex-council two-bed in Clapham (whoops; Tooting), the chances are that this low interest rate requires a low-inflation environment (in which to exist). So in other words, when the time comes to actually pay for the house at the end of the mortgage, the ‘principle’ (P) will be high in real (adjusted for inflation) terms. In other words, if your payments have stayed low, the end result will be an unaffordable bill to pay for the actual house itself.

Keep cycling and don't look back !

Bumpy road ahead

Interest rate are on the rise everywhere. Was the years of non-inflationnist growth just an illusion ?. If so the BoE might try to reach the handbrake. It might be quite tough in the next years...


"If you run a very expansionary monetary policy and the historical conjuncture happens to be such that you get no inflation, what do you get? The answer, of course, is asset price inflation and deterioration of credit. This is the troubling legacy of policy that we are now left with."

Time to change

In one month it will be the anniversary of my arrival in my current company. Great people, the company is doing great, but it also be my last time there, as I just gave my notice, and accepted a offer from one of the big financial institution. A prestigious name in the industry.

In one month it will be the second anniversary of my London arrival.

I'm having a great time!

Failing states

Via The Economist

Tell No One

I'm generally not a fan of French movies. But I really liked this one. Coherent plot, tension, good timing. With enough cheese, french nude scenes, and cliche - the french suburb scum stuff - it was a great couple of hours.

Cost of Living

Moscow tops Mercer's cost of living list; London is close behind

Paris is 13th. Dublin is 16th.

The Black Swan

The Black Swan works best as an advice book. In part, that's because the unpredictable is most undervalued in our personal lives. Too many of us are caught up in routine, or a "status quo bias," as it is labeled by economists and psychologists. We are afraid to move house or change jobs or even to imagine alternative paths. It is disquieting to think we might be making bad choices, so we close off options and we shut down self-critical reasoning, whether subconsciously or by active choice. For instance, we're likely to buy certain commercial products simply because they are familiar and therefore comforting; that is why branding and advertising so influence consumers.

Via Slate.

Dr Quantum - Double Slit Experiment

Via Digg

View from Hampstead Heath

The harmful western aid to Africa

"For God's Sake, Please Stop the Aid!"

The Kenyan economics expert James Shikwati, 35, says that aid to Africa does more harm than good. The avid proponent of globalization spoke with SPIEGEL about the disastrous effects of Western development policy in Africa, corrupt rulers, and the tendency to overstate the AIDS problem.


Spiegel interview with African economics expert

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Battle at Kruger

Via The Daily Dish