Archive for January, 2009

What will happen to mortgages when unemployment rises to 15pc? How many first-time buyers, who bought at the top of the boom, will default? Will the banks throw them out on the streets and, if this happens, what benefit will the newly recapitalised banks get from an empty house with no tenant and a defaulted mortgage?

Are we waltzing ourselves up an economic cul-de-sac without realising it? Are we making a bad situation worse?

David McWilliams was on the RTE Radio 1 Marian Finucane show last weekend (Sat 17th Jan), discussing his formative years learning Russian just outside Moscow, and his experiences in Israel and USA as well as the current economic conditions. The interview is quite lengthy and runs to almost an hour. To hear it, click on…

Could Obama be remembered as the man who presided over the greatest hyperinflation the world has ever see? At the moment, with unemployment rising, companies going to the wall and prices falling everywhere, the mention of hyperinflation seems ridiculous, that is until you examine what the new president wants to do.

David discusses the nationalisation of Anglo Irish Bank which he predicted 2 weeks previously on the RTE Radio 1 program, Morning Ireland on January 16th 2009. The program is available listen to from the RTE website

Anglo Irish Bank is Ireland’s Enron, and those responsible for destroying shareholders’ assets should be pursued accordingly. It’s not just the shareholders: the system has also failed the people miserably. We are now in a position where nobody trusts us. The minute Anglo was nationalised, the risk on Irish government debt jumped significantly because this disaster will be paid for by all of us. Our national debt has just – effectively – doubled and dodgy banks are now contaminating everything associated with Ireland.

Ireland in the Global Market : Are our Economy and Banks an International Embarrassment? 8 PM ’til LATE TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 3RD THE BUTTON FACTORY, TEMPLE BAR, DUBLIN In association with Delta Index Join host David McWilliams and a panel of experts including former Finance Minister, Alan Dukes; columnist John Waters; John O’Shea of GOAL; Sinn…

Could the unthinkable come to pass here? Could Ireland default on its sovereign debt? The answer is yes. Such a disaster is now quite possible. In the same way as a family can end up losing the house, the car, everything, a country, too, can fail to make its repayments. At the moment, such thoughts are heresy; but so, too, was questioning the property boom a mere four or five years ago.

This is war. Waterford Crystal’s collapse followed by Dell’s decision to close has signalled the opening salvoes in the war for Irish prosperity. With unemployment soaring, we are fighting on two fronts.

Think Simon Cowell and ‘the X Factor’. Think of an aspirant performer going through the motions before the denouement carried out by a cynical panel. Imagine the crestfallen starlet appealing to the audience, hoping against hope that some higher power will prevent the humiliation of being discarded. With that image in your mind, consider the scenes in the Department of Finance over the next few weeks.