The Trade of the Century: When George Soros Broke the British Pound

Re:The Trade of the Century: When George Soros Broke the Bri... by pjc50 on Thursday May 15, 2014 @07:12PM (#7752844)

In some ways, this was a comparatively cheap way for the UK to discover that fixed exchange rates between economies must force the pressure into current account deficits instead; such as has happened to Portugal/Ireland/Greece/Spain. Falling out of ERM kept the UK out of the Euro, which was beneficial in the long run.

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Re:The Trade of the Century: When George Soros Broke the Bri... by M2Ys4U on Friday May 16, 2014 @03:21AM (#7754169)

>Falling out of ERM kept the UK out of the Euro, which was beneficial in the long run.

Perhaps. That's certainly conventional wisdom, but we have no way of knowing what the political or economical landscape would have been if the UK stayed in the ERM and was now in the Eurozone. 20+ years is a long time.

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Re:The Trade of the Century: When George Soros Broke the Bri... by TazeTSchnitzel on Friday May 16, 2014 @06:48AM (#7754817)

Were it not for Brown, we might have joined the Euro.

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Re:The Trade of the Century: When George Soros Broke the Bri... by claudius on Friday May 16, 2014 @04:35AM (#7754425)

The PIGS countries would be much worse off outside the eurozone than inside, to see this, just compare the recent economical dips to the massive increase in activity following the introduction of the Euro in 2002. And to say that a country without any industry is even remotely in a good position (implied by “beneficial in the long run”) is a rather curious thing, too.

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Re:The Trade of the Century: When George Soros Broke the Bri... by pjc50 on Friday May 16, 2014 @07:29AM (#7754926)

country without any industry

This description does not match the UK, no matter how many "manufacturing is dead" articles you read in the papers.

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