| Date | Title | Description |
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| Oct 27, 2026 | Autumn Budget 2026: Healey will buy some time with the bond markets | Ahead of the upcoming Budget, the Debt Management Office’s financing choices and shifting market demands pose a critical test for government borrowing stability, says Helen Thomas
Another year, another Budget. The same party remains in char... |
| Oct 20, 2026 | Europe’s race against the ballot box | As elections approach across the continent, European leaders are rushing to settle the multi-trillion euro budget and European Central Bank leadership before potential changes in government alter the political landscape, says Helen Thomas
E... |
| Oct 13, 2026 | Central banks, bond markets and fiscal credibility – why market stability had become political | Senior central bankers warn that while emergency interventions can buy time during market liquidity crises, long-term financial stability ultimately depends on governments taking decisive political action, says Helen Thomas
Two of the world... |
| Oct 6, 2026 | Old fault lines are threatening to rock the Eurozone | After years in which central-bank backstops encouraged Eurozone investors to look the other way, the bond market has finally started to notice, writes Helen Thomas
Fifteen years after the Eurozone sovereign debt crisis, its old fault lines ... |
| Sep 29, 2026 | Markets should accept cheap money isn’t coming back | We are no longer living in the post-financial crisis world of chronically weak demand, persistent disinflation and negligible interest rates, and the market needs to adjust, writes Helen Thomas
The rise in government bond yields has been re... |
| Sep 22, 2026 | Germany’s politics have become unsustainable | German Chancellor Merz and the CDU face a severe political crisis following disastrous state election results and plunging approval ratings, says Helen Thomas
“It was a disaster” said German Chancellor Merz after the results of two key Germ... |
| Sep 7, 2026 | The Fed wants you to get used to higher interest rates | Federal Reserve Chair Kevin Warsh is urging markets to stop relying on central bank guidance and instead independently interpret economic data, signalling a shift toward a paradigm where higher interest rates are accepted as a component of ... |
| Aug 17, 2026 | US bond market jitters spark UK economy recession warning | The UK economy could be plunged into a recession an “order of magnitude” greater than recent financial crises if America’s borrowing costs continue to climb over the rest of the year, a group of leading City analysts have warned.
The US was... |
| Jul 28, 2026 | Will Britain follow Japan’s great growth gamble? | Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi has unveiled an expansionary economic blueprint aiming to break Japan’s long-standing cycle of stagnation through state-led investment, creating a precarious balancing act for the Bank of Japan as it a... |
| Jul 21, 2026 | Andy Burnham should start by scrapping the £100k tax trap | Cutting taxes is expensive, but there is a way Andy Burnham could make them simpler and fairer, says Helen Thomas
Andy Burnham’s first interview as Labour’s presumptive Prime Minister contained a somewhat unlikely observation. Speaking to t... |
| Jul 7, 2026 | South Korea is the canary in the coalmine of the AI boom | South Korea’s experiment with leveraged single-stock ETFs has shown how quickly passive investing, concentrated markets and retail speculation can feed on one another, says Helen Thomas
The new frontier for the AI boom isn’t Silicon Valley ... |
| Jun 23, 2026 | The next Prime Minister can change the conversation on the fiscal rules | Since the defenestration of Liz Truss, the OBR has become an obsession in British politics. It need not be this way. Independent fiscal institutions are supposed to inform politics, not rule it. Other countries use them as sources of transp... |
| Jun 2, 2026 | The world can’t keep consuming more than it produces | Commodity markets have proved remarkable resilient, but there is no financial engineering solution that can replace missing barrels of oil, says Helen Thomas
Commodity markets have spent the past three months performing an extraordinary bal... |
| May 19, 2026 | Markets have entered negative gamma – buckle up | Dealers are forced being to buy rallies and sell dips, increasing volatility. That should serve as a warning. Although markets currently appear calm and resilient, beneath the surface they are becoming more fragile, says Helen Thomas
Market... |
| May 12, 2026 | Bond market rounds on Rayner’s economic platform | Angela Rayner’s economic response to the Labour party’s bruising local elections defeat would trigger a sell-off in UK governments debt at a time when Britain’s borrowing costs are already at multi-decade highs, bond investors and analysts ... |
| May 12, 2026 | When does fish, chips and mushy peas become an unaffordable luxury? | When prices rise so high and budgets get so tight, consumers adjust their habits permanently. This is looming in the energy markets as the closure of the Strait of Hormuz will not be resolved any time soon, says Helen Thomas
As Ryan, the ow... |
| Mar 31, 2026 | UK bond markets are dangerously exposed | Many of the forces shaping the bond market are beyond any single government’s control. The combination of higher inflation, weaker growth and increased debt issuance is driving a global repricing of sovereign bonds, says Helen Thomas
The gl... |
| Mar 17, 2026 | Energy bills bailout speculation sparks bond sell-off fears | An unfunded government intervention to subsidise household energy bills would trigger a gilt market rout likely to push the UK’s long-term borrowing costs to the highest they have been since 1997, bond investors and economists have warned.
... |
| Mar 11, 2026 | Middle East Conflict Ignites Global Economic Turmoil | The Middle East conflict has fundamentally reshaped global economic prospects. Oil prices surge, instantly erasing earlier hopes for easing inflation. Central banks now face immense pressure to raise interest rates, not lower them. Fiscal s... |
| Mar 10, 2026 | Oil shock will be felt well beyond energy markets | Energy shocks rarely remain confined to energy markets. They propagate through bond markets, fiscal balances and inflation expectations, says Helen Thomas
As Winston Churchill once warned: “The statesman who yields to war fever must realise... |
| Jan 27, 2026 | Bambi Burnham has boosted Labour’s rivals | The strategic block of Andy Burnham’s by-election candidacy is a self-inflicted wound that signals weakness, invites challenges from internal rivals, and elevates a local contest into a national stress test of Keir Starmer’s leadership, say... |
| Dec 11, 2025 | Rachel Reeves is running out of places to hide | If clarity is not restored soon, both markets and the public will conclude that the disorder surrounding each fiscal event is not a passing miscommunication but a structural feature of the Chancellor’s approach, says Helen Thomas
“It didn’t... |
| Nov 13, 2025 | Reeves and Starmer are now at the mercy of the markets | A government elected on competence and stability may now gamble both to stave off internal revolt. For investors, the message is that British politics has not regained the calm that markets briefly hoped for, says Helen Thomas
The markets o... |
| Nov 6, 2025 | Reeves may reassure the markets, but her political future is at risk | Reeves’ speech was intended to steady nerves but instead will ignite the internal struggle that defines Labour’s next phase in power, says Helen Thomas
With just over three weeks to go until the Budget, Chancellor Rachel Reeves has decided ... |
| Oct 30, 2025 | Keir Starmer may not survive this Budget | The Prime Minister cannot satisfy all three key audiences: the markets, the party, and the public, says Helen Thomas
Every Prime Minister faces a moment when economic reality collides with political promise. For Keir Starmer, Budget day cou... |
| Oct 23, 2025 | Regulation isn’t what’s holding business back – it’s tax | The Chancellor has promised to “boldly regulate for growth” but that’s easy to say and costs nothing. The UK’s problem isn’t paperwork, it’s the relentless pressure of ever higher prices and government constraints, says Helen Thomas
The Cha... |
| Oct 9, 2025 | In Tokyo, Paris and London, political risk is on the rise | Instability in Japan, France and the UK will have global consequences for the bond markets, says Helen Thomas
For investors, the message is simple: political risk is rising. From Tokyo to Paris to London, governments face competing imperati... |
| Oct 2, 2025 | Labour is in denial about the economy | The recent Labour conference as an exercise in denial, revealing a party plagued by internal divisions and lacking a coherent economic plan, says Helen Thomas
As the Labour conference drew to a close, one word dominated the mood: denial. De... |
| Sep 29, 2025 | How are ‘bankrupt’ France’s borrowing costs still lower than ours? | Locked in a protracted political crisis over the extent of its indebtedness – and with its deficit running at over five per cent of GDP – France has earned itself the unwanted monikers of ‘the sick man of Europe’ and the ‘new Greece’. Despi... |
| Sep 25, 2025 | Will the Labour party survive its conference? | The left, just like the right, is a broad but unhappy church – will its internal rifts reach breaking point at Labour’s upcoming conference in Liverpool? Asks Helen Thomas
This Sunday, Liverpool plays host to the Labour Party conference, wh... |
| Sep 23, 2025 | Trump’s culture war turns Europe into a ‘Truman Show’ spectacle | US President Donald Trump and the American MAGA movement have launched a ‘culture war’ on Europe, says a new think tank report, warning that this transatlantic clash is reshaping European politics.
The European Council on Foreign Relations ... |
| Sep 18, 2025 | Starmer and Macron face a shared Waterloo | Facing crippling national debt and a politically divided public, both Keir Starmer and Emmanuel Macron have proved unable to implement necessary economic reforms, and both are heading for a downfall driven by market forces, says Helen Thoma... |
| Sep 4, 2025 | Sidelining Reeves now is a big gamble | Keir Starmer’s mini reshuffle has sidelined Rachel Reeves just as the markets need a show of faith, writes Helen Thomas
It only took one year, two fiscal events, three per cent plus inflation, four chiefs of staff, five directors of communi... |
| Sep 1, 2025 | The worrying bond market trend no one is talking about | Spiking interest rates on the UK government’s borrowing costs have set off a fresh wave of commentary on the health of Britain’s economy. Ali Lyon explores why it is only long-dated bonds where tremors have been most pronounced, and why the... |
| Aug 14, 2025 | Once bitten, twice inflated: The Bank of England’s rate cut conundrum | After the MPC’s historic second vote on interest rates, is the Bank of England torn between fears of recession and inflation, asks Helen Thomas
Seventeen years ago this month, the Bank of England produced its quarterly Inflation Report
as u... |
| Aug 7, 2025 | Official statistics have become useless | The pandemic has exposed the shortcomings in how we measure everything, from inflation to GDP to jobs, says Helen Thomas
Statistics haven’t quite kept pace with the world they’re meant to measure. Designed for an economy of assembly lines a... |
| Jul 30, 2025 | Trump’s gambit: play by his rules or lose | The US-EU trade deal signals a new geopolitical era where security trumps commerce, allies are rewarded for loyalty, and Trump’s strategy forces nations to pick sides – America or China? Writes Helen Thomas
The devil is usually in the detai... |
| Jul 24, 2025 | Rachel Reeves is lost in space | Rachel Reeves said was steering the economy past a black hole but her calculations are off and we’re heading for the abyss, says Helen Thomas
One year ago, the new UK Chancellor declared that upon taking office she had discovered a £22bn fi... |
| Jul 17, 2025 | Does Rachel Reeves believe in capitalism? | The Chancellor can’t do the biggest things she needs for growth because she can’t escape her own ideology, says Helen Thomas
Spin only gets you so far in the business world. Action has to back up rhetoric or the game will be found out. This... |
| Jul 10, 2025 | Something fiscal this way comes: Reeves haunted by ghosts of Truss and the OBR | Haunted by the legacy of Truss and bound by the warnings of the OBR, Chancellor Rachel Reeves now faces a political and fiscal tragedy of her own, as internal rebellion and economic risks threaten her grip on stability, says Helen Thomas
OB... |
| Jul 3, 2025 | Starmer's Welfare Woes: A Government in Turmoil | The air in Westminster is thick with tension. Sir Keir Starmer, the Prime Minister, is facing a storm. Just shy of his one-year anniversary in Downing Street, his authority has taken a severe hit. The latest debacle revolves around welfare ... |
| Jul 3, 2025 | Markets are ignoring global instability – but a reckoning looms | Despite simmering political crises and looming economic risks, markets are riding a low-volatility sugar high – fuelled by central bank interventions – but the longer reality is ignored, the sharper the eventual correction, says Helen Thoma... |
| Jul 2, 2025 | We will all pay the price for Starmer’s weakness on welfare | Keir Starmer is a weak Prime Minister and parliament has proved it can’t condone any reduction in public spending. This will end very badly, says Simon Clarke
The collapse of Labour’s plans for welfare reform marks the end of its first year... |
| Jun 26, 2025 | Political Turmoil and Human Rights Crisis: A Tale of Two Nations | In the world of politics, the chessboard is ever-shifting. Moves are calculated, alliances formed, and strategies devised. But sometimes, the game turns chaotic. This is the case in both the UK and Iran, where leaders grapple with internal ... |
| Jun 26, 2025 | Chess-playing Reeves is in a political zugzwang over welfare | A looming rebellion on welfare reforms is casting doubt on Rachel Reeves’ ability to meet her fiscal rules, says Helen Thomas
As we approach the first anniversary of the first Labour government in 14 years, we also approach its first signif... |
| Jun 12, 2025 | The Tax Burden: A Heavy Load on the Shoulders of the British Public | Tax Freedom Day has become a bitter reminder for British workers. This year, it falls later than ever, marking a grim milestone in the ongoing struggle between taxpayers and the government. The date signifies when citizens finally start wor... |
| Jun 12, 2025 | Our economy remains in a perilous state | With the long-awaited Spending Review, the UK Chancellor finally gets to reveal the goodies rather than simply be the baddie. We have been led to expect the Chancellor will announce a number of significant infrastructure projects across the... |
| May 22, 2025 | The great debt headache | Debt, debt, everywhere but not a drop to… add to any well balanced investment portfolio.
The world is awash with government bonds thanks to the debt piled up during the pandemic. But the increase in interest rates alongside the most signifi... |
| Apr 4, 2025 | Trump’s Liberation Day has delivered what he loves most: Phone calls | Like all businessmen, Trump loves being on the phone. Liberation Day was a grab for attention, and boy did it deliver, writes Helen Thomas
Liberation Day certainly delivered the kind of audience its director was looking for. The US Presiden... |
| Mar 31, 2025 | The Fiscal Tightrope: Rachel Reeves and the Taxing Times Ahead | Chancellor Rachel Reeves is walking a tightrope. Her recent Spring Statement, meant to showcase fiscal strength, has instead revealed cracks in the foundation. Just two days after her announcement, Bloomberg Economics reported that Reeves l... |
| Mar 28, 2025 | Rachel Reeves has already lost half of her £9.9bn headroom | Chancellor Rachel Reeves has had £5bn wiped off her headroom less than 48 hours after she delivered her Spring Statement, a calculation by Bloomberg Economics has suggested.
Chancellor Reeves has received several warnings from leading econo... |
