I just happened to be reading a novel set in the Edwardian era at the same time as the media was going bonkers (again) about the Reserve Bank raising interest rates by 0.25% to 3.6%. In Louis de Bernieres’s* book, The Dust That Falls from Dreams, one of the characters is holding forth about the sudden rise in the bank rate and subsequent collapse of the share market in 1914. Hamilton McCosh, a daring entrepreneur…
The end of financial year meeting of the Basil and Sybil Cheeseparer Superannuation Fund was going well until the Trustees (a) found that their investment strategy was out of sync with reality and (b) failed to find a fixed interest investment that would return more than 2.50% over five years. “We should stick it under the mattress,” said Sybil. “Your side or mine?” quipped Basil. As you should know, even if economics is not your…
A week ago a patient teller at our local bank dealt with one of my occasional visits to deposit a bag of small change. Yes, I raided the piggy-bank again, and in case you don’t believe me, there it is (left), handed out free by Macquarie Goodman at the grand opening of the Metroplex on Gateway industrial estate at Murarrie in 1998. Once I had a Bundaberg rum bottle filled to the lip with one…