Tim Worstall

From April, HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) will be able to demand a security from companies when the taxman considers there is a “serious risk” that the business will try to dodge PAYE or National Insurance Contributions (NICs). As they say: Tax officials added that the “amount of tax at risk, the employer’s previous behaviour [...]

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Facebook, on the other side of the pond, may or may not be worth $100bn, but either way it doesn’t matter. Eye instead the company’s S-1 filing with the US securities and exchange commission, and the key figures that stand out are that it took seven years to create a company with $3.7bn in revenues [...]

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Well, no Mr. Guardian caption writer, it isn’t. A mortgage is a debt (more formally, it’s the security for a debt). Gold is an asset. Terrible mistakes have occured over the centuries when people get these things confused.

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He said he had not benefited from his wrongdoing as the sum he had stolen from JC Flowers was less than the bonus, or profit share, he had forfeited when he was sacked. Didn’t work but interesting argument all the same.

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The Prime Minister added: “In the spirit of this healthy competition with France… If France goes for a financial transactions tax, then the door will be open and we will be able to welcome many French banks to the United Kingdom and we’ll expand our economy that way.” “If France wants to be so mindbogglingly [...]

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The taxpayer has lost almost £900million on the value of its shares in Royal Bank of Scotland and Lloyds Banking Group amid fears that the backlash against bonuses would damage their performance. Yah, I know, cheap shot, but wouldn’t it have been better to let Hester keep his shares?

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France has added some more rocket fuel to Monday’s already volatile summit of EU leaders by pledging to introduce a 0.1pc tax on financial transactions in August. Oh to be a property agent in London these days. Brush up on the French lessons and wait for the stampede of Frogs into London to escape the [...]

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According to Ritchie’s rules this should be counted as tax dodging, shouldn’t it? Taxman ‘denied £500,000′ as Stephen Hester waives £1m RBS bonus Stephen Hester’s decision to waive his £1 million bonus will see the Treasury lose out on hundreds of thousands of pounds, estimates suggest. A bonus to a senior banker is entirely normal [...]

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Seriously, is it entirely necessary to be ignorant of finance to write for The Guardian on finance? Greece is on the verge of a breakthrough in talks with its creditors that could wipe out up to 70% of its debts and alleviate the crisis in the eurozone. No it bloody isn’t. They’re on the verge [...]

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But this is to miss the big point. S&P and its rival Moody’s have a power……What gives S&P and Moody’s such immense power is not their brilliant analysis: it is simply the function they perform. Whether prime minister or CEO, if you want to borrow from bond markets you need a credit report to show [...]

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The Deputy Prime Minister will launch today a campaign for a “well-rewarded workforce”, saying that businesses owned by their staff are more dynamic and have higher morale. He wants to encourage companies to follow the model of John Lewis, the department store group which is owned by its employees and distributes its profits between them. [...]

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It’s a predictable whingefest. Everything is to do with deregulation and the neoliberal bastards. However, let us take one declamatory statement, at near random, and examine how well he knows his stuff. Unregulated lenders, we now know, pushed millions of Americans into home loans they could not afford. Much-deregulated investment banks packaged those lousy loans [...]

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The Budapest government saw borrowing costs soar and the currency plunge as traders bet that international authorities may abandon Hungary, letting it become the first European Union country to default on its debts. The florint fell more than 1pc to a record low against the euro and bond yields soared over 10pc. The Hungarian government, [...]

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but no article on pensions “reform” would be complete without special mention of Mr Brown’s act of pensions vandalism, when he removed the tax credit on dividends to help fund public spending. Without the abolition of this tax break, many funds would still be in surplus. Is it actually true though? Anyone know? Back when [...]

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His comments follow the revelation that Barclays has stockpiled billions of pounds of “losses” to reduce future tax bills, despite not having made a loss at group level for over a decade. They also come shortly after the pledge by Bob Diamond, Barclays’ chief executive, for “banks to be better citizens”. He then goes on [...]

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Paul Ruddock, a hedge fund manager and Tory donor who profited from the collapse of Northern Rock. The Observer, getting all het up about the Honours List. I’m afraid I don’t understand. Why are they getting all het up about making money out of Northern Rock’s collapse? We want capital to be allocated efficiently. Whatever [...]

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Given the (apparent) largesse of the German taxpayer to the Irish in terms of the financial bailout, perhaps it’s the least Ireland can do, to send two of its most famous sons to the Federal Republic to say thank you to the kind citizens of Stuttgart, Munich and Berlin for all those euros being repatriated [...]

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In the last 25 years we have allowed banks to balloon in size. Until the 1970s, banks’ assets as a percentage of UK GDP remained steady at approximately 50%. By 2006, after decades of deregulation, banks’ assets as a percentage of UK GDP were more than 500%. We’ve abolished capital controls you know. Finance has [...]

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So, 8 days ago, nine days ago, we had the announcement that the ECB would lend at 1% to any bank that could come up with even vaguely acceptable collateral. And yes, eurozone sovereign debt would be most welcome collateral, why do you ask? Thus an attempt at a solution could be seen. Get the [...]

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There’s a bit of horse and cart here. France could be stripped of its triple-A credit rating before Christmas, raising new doubts about the survival of the euro, analysts have predicted. Well, OK. Analysts said that if France’s rating was slashed its borrowing costs would rise, making it more expensive for Paris to refinance its [...]

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