Bank of England UK Housing Market Bubble Panic is Mark Carney Playing Game of Thrones

The Bank of England's relentless, monotonous statements of a stable UK housing market for the whole of 2013 that have been dutifully regurgitated by the mainstream media was punctured yesterday as the broadcast news was full of the image of money printing Mark Carney issuing a warning of the risks of an unfolding UK housing market bubble that the Bank of England would seek to take measures to counter starting with withdrawal of the funding for lending scheme for mortgages from the end of Jan 2014.

However, has everyone forgotten what Mark Carney did for Canadian House Prices ? A reminder he pumped them up by over 80%! He is following the SAME PATTERN in the UK! For that is why he was hired because he is an expert at inflating housing market bubbles! All Mark Carney did by his latest statement is in effect to act as a character out of Game of Thrones series, hiding his crafty smile behind smoke and mirrors that stealthily seeks to inflate house and other asset prices.

So, in my opinion Mark Carney's statement amounts to nothing more than a chess piece move that the Bank of England is playing in this case its objective is to act as a back covering move in case the bubble gets out of control, because there is NOTHING that the Bank of England WILL Do to kill off the housing boom that is under way because THEY played a pivotal role in ENGINEERING it into existance both in terms of supporting their bankster crime syndicate brethren at the still mostly bankrupt banks, as well as following the dicatats of their political masters who are focused on engineering an election boom and to hell with the consequences in terms of inflation and interest rates, just as Gordon Brown's Labour government sought to bankrupt Britain to maximise labour votes in the run upto the May 2010 general election as I wrote a year beforehand -

31 May 2009 - Labour Governments Bankrupt Scorched Earth UK Economy for the Conservative Government

In conclusion, the Labour government's primary objective now is to deliver David Cameron's Conservative government a scorched earth economy whilst at the same time engineering a debt fueled economic bounce to maximise the number of seats the party will be able to muster in opposition, therefore current opinion polls and projections of seats at the next election grossly under-estimate the actual number of seats Labour will win.

Again Mark Carney's statement is nothing more than him covering his back ahead of a strong housing bull market during 2014. He publically takes away a minor scheme, after replacing it with a much larger inflationary scheme, remember this follows hard on the heels of the Bank of England and Government bringing FORWARD the help to buy scheme expansion to the beginning of October. So when house price inflation busts above 10%, he can say look the Bank of England is doing something to curb house price inflation, when the truth is one of smoke and mirrors to hide the real agenda that of the Bank of England is heavily supporting the housing bull market.

UK house prices as measured by the Halifax (NSA - October ) are now rising at an annualised rate of 8% per annum as opposed to falling at a rate of over 2% per annum when I flagged an imminent UK housing multi-year bull market over a year ago.

08 Sep 2012 - UK Home Extension Planning Rules Relaxed to Boost Economy, Trigger Housing Bull Market

I am continuing to see positive signs towards a multi-year bull market, so I am giving you another head start on an emerging probable multi-year bull market in UK housing.

However, UK house prices momentum of 8% per annum whilst taking many academics by surprise lags my forecast expectations of house prices to be rising by 10% per annum for October data (19 Aug 2013 - UK House Prices Bull Market Soaring Momentum, 10% Inflation by October?). In my opinion this suggests that UK house prices will continue accelerating over the next 3 months to target an inflation rate of at least 11% per annum for January 2014 data.

So whilst the mainstream media are today falling over themselves jumping up and down like demented rabbits proclaiming that the UK housing market is in a bubble -

In terms of forecast trend trajectory UK house prices trend currently stands approx 1.5% below my forecast expectations, far from what I would class as entering a bubble phase that instead would today show trend trajectory at least 8% above forecast trend.

So forget the FT, Wall Street journal and the rest of the mainstream press, there IS NO BUBBLE in average UK house prices! Nor is there any sign there will be during the WHOLE of 2014! What we are seeing is a BULL MARKET that has momentum and trend trajectory behind it that can be sustained for many years. The problem is that the mainstream press journalists have been conditioned to only see stagnating prices, so any rising trend is perceived as a bubble. It will take many years of rising prices for the mainstream press journalists to become conditioned to rising prices and only then will they stop writing about a housing market bubble, but off course at huge detriment to their readers.

The ONLY bubble we have is a DEBT bubble and how do the government deal with a crushing debt bubble, especially in the run upto an election? The government inflates asset prices! - More in my next in depth analysis (remain subscribed to my always free newsletter to receive it in your email in box).

Don't worry, I'll let you know well in advance when the UK housing market is entering its bubble phase just as I did during 2007 right upto the very month it peaked - 22 Aug 2007 - UK Housing Market Crash of 2007 - 2008 and Steps to Protect Your Wealth

The Exponential Inflation Mega-trend

The primary consequences money printing debt monetization programmes that all governments are engaged in, in an attempt to buy votes through deficit spending, is to feed the exponential inflation mega-trend. Which this article should act as a timely reminder of that asset prices are leveraged to and oscillate around the exponential inflation mega-trend which currently has UK inflation compounding inflation at the rate of 2.2% per year which resolves in the following exponential trend.

As I pointed out near 4 years ago in the Inflation Mega-trend ebook (FREE DOWNLOAD), Governments only have one answer which is to PRINT MONEY! No matter what names it goes by, be it called QE, or government bonds, it is all money printing that results in Inflation.

Rising UK Interest Rate

The announcement by Mark Carney of cutting funding for lending loans for mortgage lending will have the effect of pushing mortgage interest rates higher by upto 1%, and thus savings interest rates should rise by a similar amount therefore those looking to fix mortgages the time to act is NOW, whilst those looking to fix savings should see much better rates of upto 1% higher during Q1 of 2014.

Whilst the mainstream financial press had swallowed Bank of England Propaganda for the whole of 2013 that UK Interest rates would be kept on hold until 2016 as a consequence of the Bank of England targeting a 7% Unemployment rate, are now busy covering their backs Mark Carney style that interest rates could rise significantly before the end of next year, this illustrates that the mainstream media always stands at least a year behind the curve.

Instead my expectations have remained consistent since March 2011 in expecting UK Base Interest rates to target 4.5% by the end of 2014, which is still something far beyond anything that the collective consciousness of the mainstream financial press even after Mark Carneys statement, as I warned of several months ago of what to expect would happen to the UK inflation and interest rates as the UK converged on an 7% Unemployment rate.

19 Aug 2013 - UK House Prices Bull Market Soaring Momentum, 10% Inflation by October?

Expect when UK Unemployment falls to 7% for the UK Inflation rate to have also risen to 7%.

Interest Rates to Rise Sooner than Anyone Expects?

So, according to the Bank England the next interest rate rise is at least 3 years away. Well I'll let you you into a little secret, and that is when the government or one of its institutions makes a definite statement that x is going to happen for many years, a bandwagon on which over 90% of the media jumps onboard, then there is a very high probability that the exact opposite is going to happen!

Therefore forget about 0.5% UK interest rates in 3 years time, far more probable is 4.5% interest rates by the end of NEXT year! This is not something that I've plucked out of thin air but is based on the conclusion of my long standing analysis dating back to March 2011 (08 Mar 2011 - UK Interest Rate Forecast 2011 - Conclusion and Implications - Part 2 ), I even wrote a whole ebook explaining why I expected UK interest rates would rise to 4.5% by the end of 2014. (The Interest Rate Mega-trend - FREE DOWNLOAD). Which implies significantly HIGHER mortgage interest rates than anyone expects today.

The point is that the Bank of England does NOT control interest rates, instead interest rates are controlled by the money markets. All it would take for interest rates to rise is for a relentless flow of foreign currency out of the UK. The reasons for which will become apparent with the benefit of hindsight, which I can only speculate about at this point in time, such as worsening inflation expectations, or that the flaws in the Euro-zone are fixed, or any one of a 10 other possibilities, which I am sure the academics looking in their rear view mirrors will happily write about for many years AFTER the fact!

Off course when interest rates rise by the end of next year the academics and the mass media that have swallowed the 0.5% interest rate economic propaganda hook line and sinker will all suffer collective amnesia and march on as though they had always anticipated high UK interest rates all along, as will Mark Carney at the Bank of England.

So what are the mainstream press still missing from recent optimistic press reporting on accelerating UK GDP growth that I expect will exceed 3% for 2014, it is consequences of the INFLATION which is RISING INTEREST RATES! Not hints of, but actual rate hikes far beyond anything that is being imagined today.

Therefore take this as a timely reminder that a 0.5% base interest rate is not NORMAL, it is a PANIC MEASURE purely to prevent the bankrupt Banking crime syndicate from imploding. Unfortunately, after having interest rates at a 300 year lows for 5 years has conditioned many people into perceiving them to be the norm when they are NOT. The norm is more like 4.5% and NOT 0.5%.

Rising Interest Rates Impact on the Housing Market

Again, I refer to my earlier article - 19 Aug 2013 - UK House Prices Bull Market Soaring Momentum, 10% Inflation by October?

I am sure that many people reading this will naturally conclude that higher interest rates will be a big negative for the housing market that could imply a bear market or even market crash. I am sure such expectations will become prevalent in the mainstream press as soon as interest rates start to rise, but I am going tell you now, long before even the first interest rate hike takes place that interest rate hikes are NOT going to make ANY difference to the housing bull market, for the rate rises would reflect a normalisation of the UK interest rate market and NOT a panic event.

Again the primary driver will be SENTIMENT!

When house prices are rising at a pace that is more than people earn, will their mortgage costs rising by approx 1/3rd make such an impact on sentiment? I don't think so, not by the end of 2014 when the UK housing market will be rising by at least 10% per annum, or on average prices of £230k of about £23k per annum! TAX FREE! (own properties).

So

1. Prepare for interest rate hikes long before anyone in the mainstream media or academics can imagine today.

2. That the rate rises will NOT result in a bear market or worse a crash as the trend momentum by then will have a couple of years under it's belt and the longer a trend goes on the more likely it is to continue towards the final blow off bubble stage, that would still be many years away.

Though off course the Banking crime syndicate has not waited for the detached and largely irrelevant base interest rate to rise, for they have already been hiking borrowing rates for several years now to well above base rate.

The bottom line is an election boom is now underway that will manifest itself in house prices inflation averaging at least 10% per annum, and normalisation of the UK interest rate market that will drag the Bank of England's base rate higher no matter what the Governor of the Bank of England states.

Bitcoins the Real Tulip Mania Bubble Ponzi Scheme

Whilst many mistakenly focus on UK housing market as being in a bubble a real tulip mania-esk bubble primed to burst is taking place in bitcoins, as the price continues to explode into the stratosphere that the mainstream media illustrated by way of the human story of how one bitcoin miner threw away his hard drive that reportedly contained 7,500 bitcoins that at today's market price would be worth over £5 million.

The bitcoin miner, James Howells was shown at the rubbish tip where his hard drive lies buried under tens of metres of compacted refuse leaving James to ponder that even if he could find the hard drive, would it have survived several months under a wet rotting mountain of waste.

Off course the reason why he did not pay that much attention to the fortune that resided on his dumped hard drive was because when he threw it away the value was far, far less than 1/20th of today's price, with little media attention at the time to remind him of its potential value which has seen the Bitcoin USD price rise from about $14 at the start of the year to more than $1200 today.

Though throwing away £200k valuation of a couple of months ago was still a pretty dumb thing to do, which reflects the truth of the Bitcoin tulip mania as James had mined his bitcoins (solving blocks, the complexity and processing power needed is constantly increasing in response to increasing supply) several years earlier using his personal computer, and that all they were actually worth at the time was marginally more than the cost of the electricity expended, so no more than perhaps £50 rather than today's £5 million valuation.

So take this as a warning to all those who have been piling into the Bitcoin tulip mania (mostly gullible chinese investors trying to hide their wealth from their corrupt chinese communist party controlled government ) need to realise that the real value of bitcoins is near 1/100,000 of the current price and therefore the potential losses they WILL suffer when this i-bubble bursts will far exceed a 99% loss! AND IT WILL BURST as soon as any of the bitcoin hoarders who mined vast stock piles during the early years try to offload their holdings, an event which is probably imminent if not already underway as you read this article.

As was the case for the original Tulip Mania, following the bursting of the bubble Bitcoins will soon be forgotten and so will the craze for all peer to peer i-currencies, as the bottom line is that bitcoins never matched the hype for transactions are NOT anonymous and it IS heavily manipulated by a handful of mining pools so is not decentralised as today ordinary people cannot muster the processing power required to mine for bitcoins.

The bottom line is that bitcoins are a pyramid ponzi scheme where those who got in early win, whilst everyone else loses. If you own bitcoins then you should get out IMMEDIATELY!

Raging U.S. Housing Bull Market, Outlook for 2014

The latest U.S. house price data released recently for September shows U.S. house price inflation momentum has continued to soar to an annualised rate of more than 13% well beyond the expectations of even the few bullish market commentators at the start of the year, whilst the bears are left to wallow in a state of perma-tripe that continues to go completely contrary to what has actually been transpiring during 2013.

U.S. house prices continue to soar to a momentum rate that is significantly beyond my trend trajectory for US house prices to target a trend of 10% per annum, with longer term expectations for US house prices to rise by at least 30% by early 2016.

What are the Implications if Momentum Going into 2014?

I would not be surprised if current strong momentum is sustained into data for February 2014 to be released in April 2014. Therefore U.S. house prices could be rising at an annualised rate of more than 16% per annum! However, such momentum would NOT be sustainable and WOULD give way to a correction to an inflation rate of under 10% and I would not be surprised if it falls to 7% by July 2014 data to be released in September 2014.

So, my expectations are now for a continuing strong rally into April 2014, to be followed by a sharp slowdown in price rises as U.S. house prices consolidate for the remainder of the year, which I am sure will be taken by many perma-bear clueless commentators to imply that the housing boom is over when in reality it would just be the US housing market unwinding from an very overbought state in preparation for their next leg higher that targets a rise of at least 30% by early 2016.

12 Jan 2013 - U.S. Housing Real Estate Market House Prices Trend Forecast 2013 to 2016)

US House Prices Forecast Conclusion - As you read this, the embryonic nominal bull market of 2012 is morphing into a real terms bull market of 2013, with each subsequent year expected to result in an accelerating multi-year trend that will likely see average prices rise by over 30% by early 2016, which translates into a precise house prices forecast based on the most recent Case-Shiller House Price Index (CSXR) of 158.8 (Oct 2012 - released 26th Dec 2012) targeting a rise to 207 by early 2016 (+30.4%).

So whilst US house prices may be currently soaring well beyond my expectations of Jan 2013. However, when compared against expectations of far more prominent market commentators such as Peter Schiff of just a few months ago, who's expectations were literally for a CRASH, the US housing market is literally galloping up a mountain of worry.

By Peter Schiff - concluding -

Of course the real risks in housing center on the next leg down, in what I believe will be a continuation of the real estate crash. We can’t afford to artificially support the market indefinitely. When significantly higher interest rates eventually arrive, the fragile market will again be impacted. We saw that movie about five years ago. Do we really want to see it again?

U.S. house prices now stand 13% higher on the published data (Feb 2013) at the time of Peter Schiff's article, and therefore US house prices would need to fall by 13% just for Peter Schiff to break even on his US housing market expectations. Though off course when U.S. house prices do eventually correct, then such 'technicalities' will be ignored by the mainstream financial media, as is usually the case.

So what is it that the likes of Peter Schiff are missing ?

After all it is very easy to construct a bearish argument, I can do it very well, perhaps even better than most of the perma-bears, such as drawing on the the prospects for rising interest rates, after all U.S. treasury yields have been steadily rising for a while which has been picked up the perma-clueless crowd as a signal for a housing market CRASH that is just NOT going to happen! I mean the rate of inflation is not even going to slow for another 6 months, never mind actual FALLING house prices!

What many remain blind to is the fundamental driver that has remained constant for the PAST 5 years for stocks which is the exponential inflation mega-trend, the primary consequences of money printing debt monetization programmes that all governments are engaged in an attempt to buy votes through deficit spending, which feeds the exponential inflation mega-trend, which even manifests itself in the highly doctored official CPI data that under reports the real rate of inflation that people actual experience. So whilst the current U.S. CPI stands at a highly beguilingly mild 1.2%, however this STILL resolves in an EXPONENTIAL Inflation Mega-trend.

As I pointed out near 4 years ago in the Inflation Mega-trend ebook (FREE DOWNLOAD), governments only have one answer which is to PRINT MONEY! No matter what names it goes by, be it called QE, or government bonds, it is all money printing that results in Inflation against which asset prices are leveraged and oscillate around.

Pay Day Loans Judgement Day - Could Interest Rate Cap Trigger Ponzi Debt Industry Collapse?

The government and FCA regulator are finally starting to get their act together concerning the legalised loan sharks that comes perhaps as long as a decade too late for many victims of the Pay Day Loans industry that entices usually inexperienced and desperate borrowers to get into debt at rates of interest that ensure that rolled over debts will soon multiply to many times the original sum borrowed.

Even today, the Citizen Advice Bureau reports that 75% of pay day loans borrowers struggle to repay their loans, and that lenders break promises to freeze interest and charges 84% of the time.

I have been warning for at least 5 years of the dangers that the Pay Day loans industry represents for potential borrowers that ultimately represents a failure of both the previous Labour government, current Collation government and FSA / FCA to properly regulate and cap interest rates charged by what amount to legalised loan sharks.

The Inflation Mega-Trend Ebook (FREE DOWNLOAD) - Page 50

Pay Day Loans - During the great recession many pay day loan outfits have sprung up that offer to fill the gap between each pay cheque with near instant small loans of upto £1000 that borrowers are further enticed to roll over into the next pay day. To be blunt, if you are considering these types of loans then you might as well put a gun to your head for all of the distress they will eventually cause you. Whilst the base rate is at 0.5%, pay day loan outfits are charging over 2,000% APR. These types of loans should be illegal in Britain but they are not, which just illustrates how inept the financial regulator is in allowing ordinary citizens to fall victim to 'legal' loan sharks. If the FSA had the best interests of the general public at heart then it would lobby the government to introduce legislation to CAP ALL interest rates at base rate plus 10%. Yes it would mean that the financially illiterate presently taking on extremely high risk loans would usually be denied loans due to the risk / reward factor, but that is how it should be.

The Pay Day loans industry is just further evidence of Britain's Bankster run financial system that has been supported by the regulators that have looked the other way so that their colleagues in the financial sector have fleeced the most vulnerable in society of their meager earnings. The financial entities that deliver Pay Day Loan services charging as much as over 4,000% APR are typically subsidiaries of tax payer bailed out banks that refuse to lend at lower rates thus forcing vulnerable customers into the arms of their Pay Day subsidiaries.

However, with an general election fast approaching, the Government is responding to growing outrage amongst potential voters and the recently renamed FSA as the FCA are giving indications of cracking down on the loan sharks that they have looked the other way on for the past decade in the form of a interest rate cap to be amended to the Banking Reform Bill that is currently going through Parliament. Unfortunately, given the governments and regulators abysmal track record, it is highly likely that there will be many loop holes built into the legislation so to allow business as usual.

Pay Day Loans Subprime Debt Industry Collapse?

Whilst its good news that the FCA will finally be targeting the the aggressive debt collection practices of the largely unregulated payday loans industry that has mushroomed over the past 5 years to stand at well over 250 providers, all competing against one another to lend money to those that cannot afford to repay the loans in what appears to be a classic Ponzi scheme-esk structure where loans are usually given to individuals without any background checks that are increasingly for the purpose of repaying loans taken out from other payday lenders, and then again and again which means that payday lenders are effectively paying one another resulting in what is a growing Ponzi pyramid primed for collapse.

You all should know how this could all end for we have seen it all before with the US subprime crash that triggered the financial crisis of 2008, something that we are still trying to overcome.

In fact Payday Loans is Subprime on speed, which means that when the Pay day loans Ponzi bubble bursts it will be in a far more spectacular style than the slow burn that was subprime crash that started to go belie-up in early 2007, taking a good 18 months to hit the financial armageddon stage.

With the stage now set for the government to finally start to act to deal with these legalised loan sharks, so the pay day loans industry is primed for a market to collapse, because financial markets discount the future, they propel a trend into the stratosphere that is primed for a crash, just as is the case with every bubble.

The collapse of the payday loans industry could take place over a matter of weeks or even days as the tulips that the payday loan companies are nurturing (borrowers) are realised to be seen as worthless as they will never be able to repay the debt, and then, suddenly the penny drops and all of the monies invested (loans) cease to exist ponzi style because the merry go around of cycling loans between providers comes to an abrupt end, just as during August 2007 the mortgage backed securities market froze on the realisation that the triple AAA MBS that the banks were invested in were worthless and so were the insurers who had insured the MBS against default.

What Will be the Consequences of the PayDay Loans Ponzi Scheme Collapse?

When the Ponzi scheme eventually does collapse then the fallout will be on the investors and lenders to the payday loan companies, just as with the subprime mortgages these investors and lenders will have been solely focused on the size of the ever expanding payday loan books, all without realising that the loan books were increasingly effectively comprised of monies used to repay other payday loan companies in an ever expanding debt pyramid, which is backed by no real assets, as those that tend to heavily borrow from payday loans have already exhausted every other avenue in terms of using up any collateral they had.

My only hope is that the fools in Westminister do not throw a further estimated £10 billion more of tax payer monies in bailout cash at the banks many of whom will be found out to be heavily exposed to the payday lenders, just as following the subprime crash of 2008 the banks then plowed headlong into peripheral Euro-zone government bonds, that a year or so later started to collapse thus triggering a further series of mega taxpayer funded bank bailouts.

Therefore, I come back to my original conclusion the eventual legislation will be heavily watered down with many loopholes aimed at supporting the pay day loans subprime lenders from collapsing. I can imagine that today's high interest rates will convert into a myriad of fees that will be added on, much as banks such as the Halifax charge £1 a day even if you only go £1 into debt on a planned overdraft, whilst an unplanned overdraft of £1 gets hit with a £5 daily fee!

So an interest rate cap will likely result in little reprieve for pay day loans borrowers because the Government, and FCA will be more afraid of the consequences of a collapse of the Pay Day Loans industry, especially in the run up to a general election.

Iran Nuclear Deal

Meanwhile during the weekend many politicians could be seen busily congratulating themselves in the mainstream press over the interim Iran nuclear deal, which first seeks to freeze and then dismantle parts of Iran's nuclear weapons programme, which if true would amount to great news as it would ultimately imply one less nation with its finger on the trigger of armageddon.

Unfortunately as my recent video analysis explained why, I very much doubt that the announced deal will actually pan out in its goals given that -

a. Israel has 120 nuclear weapons

b. Sunni Pakistan has 120 nuclear weapons

c. Sunni Saudi Arabia has at least 6 Pakistani nukes on order and ready to be dispatched on request.

Unless these issues are addressed then it is highly improbable that Iran will suspend let alone scrap its $100+ billion nuclear weapons programme, especially as all of the enriched uranium will remain within Iran and also that it is highly unlikely the US will lift most of the sanctions against Iran because there are so many flash points other than the nuclear issue such as Syria.

At best the nuclear deal buys the western powers some time by slowing down Iran's nuclear programme, though without a solution to the bigger issue that encourages countries such as Iran and Saudi Arabia to go nuclear which is Israel's extensive nuclear weapons programme, then the outcome of the trend trajectory remains inevitable, which is a nuclear weapons armed Iran.

Ensure you remain subscribed to my always free newsletter for ongoing in-depth analysis, detailed trend forecasts, and strategies attempting to protect from and capitalise on the exponential Inflation mega-trend.

Source and Comments: http://www.marketoracle.co.uk/Article43337.html

Nadeem Walayat

http://www.marketoracle.co.uk

Copyright © 2005-2013 Marketoracle.co.uk (Market Oracle Ltd). All rights reserved.

Nadeem Walayat has over 25 years experience of trading derivatives, portfolio management and analysing the financial markets, including one of few who both anticipated and Beat the 1987 Crash. Nadeem's forward looking analysis focuses on UK inflation, economy, interest rates and housing market. He is the author of four ebook's in the The Inflation Mega-Trend and Stocks Stealth Bull Market series.that can be downloaded for Free.

Nadeem is the Editor of The Market Oracle, a FREE Daily Financial Markets Analysis & Forecasting online publication that presents in-depth analysis from over 600 experienced analysts on a range of views of the probable direction of the financial markets, thus enabling our readers to arrive at an informed opinion on future market direction. http://www.marketoracle.co.uk

Disclaimer: The above is a matter of opinion provided for general information purposes only and is not intended as investment advice. Information and analysis above are derived from sources and utilising methods believed to be reliable, but we cannot accept responsibility for any trading losses you may incur as a result of this analysis. Individuals should consult with their personal financial advisors before engaging in any trading activities.

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