This is the time to upgrade our market predictions.

[Bouba]

I don’t know about doom and gloom....the markets are different nowadays....what previously would be considered a crash is just a daily spike...I think...I hope...all will be well ?????

 

[Zing]

Scary thing is that it's happening.
- Ukraine the breadbasket of Europe
- This year's crop won't be planted
- Russia produces the fertilizer
- Wheat prices go sky high, production not helped by high diesel price
- People get a whiff of a shortage and stockpile (humorously with toilet rolls)..

I'm old enough to remember a bread shortage when I was just a lad..

I think the author's a silver trader so knows a thing or two about commodities. We'll see.

It is a concern though. Inflation: Food, energy, commodities is a real and serious problem. Food shortages more so. It’s not easy to boost production of food. We can live ok without a bit of heat from a gas shortage, but not without food.

 

[ari]

Ooh, we've not had a good 'WE'RE ALL DOOMED' boat price crash thread on here for ages!

I think the last time was when covid struck two years ago, and it was confidentially predicted that prices would drop as a result.

I'm old enough to remember when all this was fields, and that bloke with the big Trader who was always at war with whoever had sold him a boat (Guldy? Gludy?) was confidently predicting a massive crash in the price of diesel boats when the full red duty allowance was reduced.

In all that time, I've never quite understood why people who own boats talk so gleefully about an impending drop in asset value. I guess if you're hoping to buy a bigger one maybe it's a good thing.

 

[oldgit]

In all that time, I've never quite understood why people who own boats talk so gleefully about an impending drop in asset value. I guess if you're hoping to buy a bigger one maybe it's a good thing.

In Ye Olden days have been assured that it was almost impossible to lose money on any boat, many folks worked their way up the ladder making small (sometimes large ) profits on each respective boat.
Those apparently were the days and long gone before OG owned anything bigger than a rubbber duck.
Secondhand boat prices have been on a gentle decline over the past decade or two much to the chagrin of their owners, right up until until Covid hit.
Not much to do and with green fields and more the passing of the days of "Red" at 10p per honest english gallon.
Tales of folks turning up at the club on a Friday , having few pints, filling up with "Red " at 80p a gallon and simply blasting off to Ramsgate for "somewhere to go" .
Going to guess you have not had to put any fuel in your boat recently.

 

[ari]

Well, that's your experience I guess.

YMMV, as the saying has it.

 

[prinex]

- Ukraine the breadbasket of Europe
- This year's crop won't be planted
- Russia produces the fertilizer
- Wheat prices go sky high, production not helped by high diesel price
- People get a whiff of a shortage and stockpile (humorously with toilet rolls)..

This has mostly to do with the EU rule on food import, they could as well import South-American produce - they don't do it due to protection of internal EU market. And at the end is just money, I had a chat with a Ceramic Tile producer - their have one month left of earth to burn (it came from Ukraina) and then is over. Alternative is buying it from Germany - is more expensive but so be it. So when your wife wants a new bathroom is 15% more for the tiles.

We still throw away 50% of EU produce for aesthetics reasons only, the apple not really round, the carrot which is not straight etc. And buy astonishing amounts of useless crap (pleasure boats / cars included specially the bigger ones) just for fun - hell we even throw away the perfect working iphone, 2 years old, to buy a new one for 1K.

So we in the land of the fat will just feel a ripple and forget about it (did not we just had 2 years of pandemic ? Where are the scores of homeless ? I could not get a reservation at the Pizzeria for Saturday...)

Different story for the Third-world countries - no bread, revolution etc. But their problem is politics / corruption etc, their "elite" steals everything and even if there is a famine they keep on stealing, not even having the decency to say ok lets steal a bit less this time.

Ukraina is a tragedy. But also an opportunity to find the next villain (last one was Covid) - Gas up ? Blame Vladi. At least it replaced "Climate change" as a reason for price increases, this one will come back after the war.

So business as usual, earth keep rolling, some oil trader will be caught out and lose (his customers) money, some EFT-is-the-next-hype will have to buy a Honda and not a Merc, the AAA Luxemburg "Emerging Economies" fund turned out to have 45% Russian bonds - sorry just sue UBS or Credit Suisse.

And in the process, hopefully, the combination of less "I-want-a-boat" people and more "I-need-to-get-money-for-it" people will turn out some nice deal for some of us.

 

[Portofino]

Rounding a few up in Liguria. Down to 100 ftrs now I have translated the text below from the local news .




The Customs Office of Imperia and the Port Authority of Imperia have seized a Motor Yacht called "New Vogue", a yacht of about 30 meters and worth over 3.3 million euros, currently moored at the dock tourism of Imperia-Porto Maurizio and attributable to Russian subjects.

The seizure of the boat was ordered by the Public Prosecutor's Office of the Court of Imperia at the end of an intense judicial police investigation which began at the beginning of March, when the ADM and Port Authority officials carried out an inspection. in the customs areas of the Imperia port and subsequently arranged a discreet surveillance activity to ensure that the “New Vogue” ship did not leave the mooring.

For the purposes of the investigation, information was acquired from the Customs of a third country, through the Russian / Ukraine Temporary Crisis Unit (UTCRU) set up at the central offices of ADM.

"The result obtained shows once again the excellent synergy guaranteed by ADM and the Port Authority Corps under the coordination of the Public Prosecutor's Office" they say.