Market responses to elections should be treated with caution. 2024 is a year of elections around the globe – in varying shades of democracy. On some counts, around 60 countries will vote, representing close to half of the world’s population. This includes eight of the...
The fees for obtaining probate in England and Wales have increased. The fee charged to obtain probate in England and Wales has been increased from £273 to £300 (10%) and for confirmation in Scotland, which has a sliding scale by 2%. Northern Ireland revised its...
Not That Interested: savers short-changed on rate hikes. The Bank of England has been looking at the impact of its regular interest rate increases since December 2021, with analysis revealing savers are being short-changed. Every three months the Bank of England...
The Office for National Statistics (ONS) has been sorting through its inflation shopping basket. Every year in March, the ONS announces the results of a review of the approximately 750 items which it uses to compute inflation indices, such as the Consumer Price Index...
The Prime Minister has met his pledge of halving inflation, but we’re not out of the woods yet. In the first week of 2023, the then still new Prime Minister, Rishi Sunak, set out “five immediate priorities” for his government. The first of these was: “We will halve...
What was almost certainly the last Budget before the election was a serving of the widely expected, sprinkled with a handful of small surprises. The Chancellor of the Exchequer, Jeremy Hunt, delivered the Spring Budget 2024 on 6 March. As anticipated, it was a typical...
New data on marriage and civil partnerships shows a significant threshold has been crossed. ‘Population estimates by marital status and living arrangements, England and Wales: 2022’, sounds like a rather esoteric piece of academic output from the Office for National...
As the FTSE 100 turned 40 on 3 January 2024, we look at how it compared to its predecessor and the lessons learned from four decades of growth versus inflation. The Financial Times Stock Exchange (FTSE) 100 Index, to use the Footsie’s full name, has celebrated its...
A date to note in this year’s calendar is the early Spring Budget on Wednesday 6 March. The Treasury issued a press release in the time between Christmas and the New Year revealing the Spring Budget date, a week earlier than in 2023. The unusual timing of the...
The media storm surrounding HMRC taxing eBay and other online sellers from the start of 2024 was, in fact, itself counterfeit goods. A crop of stories across social and traditional media swirled across the start of the new year about HMRC cracking down on ‘side...
At the start of 2023, the Prime Minister pledged to halve inflation. The goal was reached, but how much credit can he take for the achievement? Inflation across 2023, as measured by the Consumer Prices Index (CPI) ended at 4.0%, a far cry from the 10.5% of 2022 and...
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