Senior
With pound at a low of 2.07-2.08, would anyone convert into pound at 2.07-2.08 and wait for it to go back up to 2.3 or pump it into property? Some people say pound offers no interest so not attractive, but with the pound at all time low, it may be a good time to enter. What are your views?
Newbie
Offshore banking offer at least 5% of interest for pound. Check out nationwide or so...Originally Posted by Regulators
Newbie
as a frequent visitor to london, i'm currently in london for 3 weeks and just come across your question.
please allow me to express a somewhat simplistic view, being no economist.
gbp/sgd is currently such because of the relative strength of the sgd.
you should also look at gbp/euro and euro/usd.
many stores in london are and have been offering products at euro parity since 2009. what does this say?
what is the GBP backed by? gordon brown sold their entire inventory of gold.
further to that, the UK economy has been on the decline since the 1990's.
UK standard of education has also been on the decline.
the UK has no native industries that they can call their own now.
no doubt the rich in europe still like to go to london for shopping and living. but that is hardly a sign of a country's economic strength and they do also live and shop in monaco as well as zurich.
mine is just a surface view of the UK, i'm sure there's a lot more if you go into detail.
Senior
thanks for your views. enjoy your holiday
Exalted
cheap can get cheaper
expensive can get more expensive
Newbie
off topic
chinese yuen better.. can float later.
Newbie
Well, UK did not sell all their gold reserves -old Gordon sold 60%, they still have over 310 tonnes of the stuff according to wikipedia (not sure how reputable this is) and apparently this is 15% of their forex reserves.
For Singapore gold is on 2.3% of the forex reserves, so if the logic is more gold = stronger currency - then it seems SGD is in an even worse position. What is our currency backed by? even less gold & even more lousy USD yet paradoxically it's getting stronger.
Also Singapore has no native industry and never has either (ok got Creative, but been talking about them for 15 years and no one else). Still no MNC or native product to talk about, so that argument also don't matter. I'm also pretty sure it's not true that they have no native industry - that seems a rather off the cuff remark & not sure what it's backed by.
UK is going through a crisis that's for sure. But having been a regular visitor
for last 2 decades I have seen all kinds of ups and downs - not sure it can get any worse for them & Cameron seems pretty determined to regain control of spending.
reminds me - book a car at heathrow today for December, take advantage of the low rate. Maybe go shopping for another apt while their too..... but maybe not sure house decline is over yet.
Newbie
question is how to benefit?
How do you buy it & hold it. This is a serious question, I would definitely buy and hold until it's forced to revalue to something approaching it's proper value.
One thing for sure is that they are definitely manipulating their currency. Which nation has ever pulled itself out of the mud and not seen it's currency rise? It's a natural progression , think of Yen , Won and SGD when readily convertible.
Newbie
good morning ebd, thanks for the reply....i learn new things every day from this forum. i mainly read and lurk in the shadows, it is hard to type on a phone or ipad but have lately been trying to join in discussions online.
singapore is an incorporated company, not a country. its only natural resource is labour. its economy is backed by severe manipulation of its workforce and smart allocation of the workforce in lucrative industries. in a way, singapore's management has the ability to be flexible in the allocation of its resources.
and if there is not enough natural resources, we always import more.
so it can be indirectly construed that singapore's currency strength today is backed by high productivity due to its swelling of its natural resource to 5million people in the last year.
although human resource is a great part of our economy, we do not encourage parasitic layabouts that drain the company. any unproductive resource is immediately channelled into other use, or terminated with immediate effect. we also do not have strikes and unions at our company nor policies that handicap our company.
Newbie
reserves consists of commodities and foreign currencies. Our reserve is one of the largest in the world also because our government is prudent. You're right, the reserve is in other people's money, especially US$, not just pounds. So it's a problem all countries face, not only Singapore and UK face thus i feel that to some extent cancels out the ill since everyone including China faces this problem.
As for industries, our industries lies with SIA, PSA, Keppel, etc. Not forgetting HDB which is paying the government money everyday. We are number one in airport management, seaport management, oil rig building, water management. If you watch the last James Bond movies, in one of the scene the villian said: this is the most important resource in the world and we must control as much of it as we can. Eveyone thought it was oil, but turned out it was water. Singapore now's the authority for water resource management in the world.
So that said, i feel that the main problem is UK doesn't have these assets and in general, all western countries look at cash flow when it comes to country's finance. But only a handful converts positive cash flow into assets, like Singapore. Western countries usually have positive cashflow, they look for ways to spend it.
Moreover, Singapore uses supply side policies when there is surplus while UK uses demand side policies. That also means over time Singapore will get more and more efficient and competitive, while UK only gets to spend more and more.
The UK pound has some way to go before it goes up. I think everyone have their own views but if Regulators asked around, most are pessimistic about their future because they are broke. I've been broke before so i know to crawl out of hell is very tough. Easier to just print.
Cameroon's got his job cut out for him.
As for the yuan for now they will be a good buy. But for me the phenomenon is that the world is learning chinese faster than china is learning english.
i go to France, french guy says: ni hao, to me at the traffic light
i go to thailand, the guy riding the tut tut turns and ask me in chinese: mr, go where
i go to china and teach, i say: good morning class... no one says anything
i go on the streets in china and say: excuse me, people actually run off
So if this goes on, they will turn out like japan and it will be a big problem.
As always, those are my humble thoughts and i harbour no ill intent.
Newbie
I think buying Euros is a better option. What is the GBP backed by? Their own GDP?
Senior
What then is SGD backed by? Does Singapore have reserves and resources more than UK?
Exalted
SGD consists of a basket of currencies....we cannot check consists of wat though....its concealed basket....
if u worry about SGD currency...the only alternative is GOLD oredi....international currency
Senior
but if gbp and euro continues to slide against sgd, i think mas will probably step in to adjust sgd against european currencies.
Newbie
Errr... I am comparing GBP to Euros. Which would you choose? Buy GBP or Euros?
Senior
the topic is converting SGD to GBP as GBP is at all time low. When soros banked on pounds, almost the whole world was against pounds. the uptrend for pounds may not be likely in the near term, but in the long term, will pound remain at this rate to SGD?
Senior
to correct myself, soros speculated that pound would fall when the sentiments were against him. Now the pound is at a low, speculators that say it might fall further could be wrong. Just a thought.
Newbie
Damned the pound. A bit of OT here. I bought into BP in sterling pounds feeling that once they capped the leak, it should go back to pre-explosion levels. 3 weeks after the successful capping, the bl**dy price is still hovering where I had bought before the capping work. End of OT.
Should have dumped into Euros instead.
Senior
you still holding to pound? at what price you bought?
Damned the pound. A bit of OT here. I bought into BP in sterling pounds feeling that once they capped the leak, it should go back to pre-explosion levels. 3 weeks after the successful capping, the bl**dy price is still hovering where I had bought before the capping work. End of OT.
Should have dumped into Euros instead.
Newbie
How about Australi currency?
OCBC offering 4 plus percent for FD and Australia has abundant recources whcih can sustain them for next century...
Senior
aud should have entered at 1.20, but a bit high now it seems
Newbie
GBP 3.9985
Senior
how much did you change?
GBP 3.9985
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