MoneyWeek magazine issue 387

Jun 06, 2008 / issue 387

Beat inflation

Now's the time to buy... PLUS:

• Why the era of cheap flights could be over

• The best ways to play the foreign currency markets

• Bill Bonner: is it time to short the human race?

From the editor

By Merryn Somerset Webb

Make sure you know who's running your funds
It looks like a mixture of total lack of awareness and mild stupidity is par for the course across the UK banking sector. Just like Northern Rock, B&B has clearly spent the last few years in total denial – refusing to accept that the housing market was in a bubble and hence fuelling the fire of its own destruction by providing the credit to keep the bubble growing.

And just like Northern Rock, senior management appeared to be blissfully unaware of the all-too-obvious risks to their business. At the start of this year, even as volumes – the canary in the coal mine to the housing market – collapsed across the country, B&B announced that it was relying on growth in its buy-to-let business to keep things going. Whoops.

Read the full editor's letter here: Make sure you check who’s running your funds