An index-linked gilt – known as a linker in City speak – is a government IOU whose principal and interest payments rise with the Retail Prices Index (RPI). Inflation erodes the value of an ordinary bond; a linker compensates the holder for it. The post-Covid inflation shock showed why anybody would want one. Inflation, thought […]
The Iran war has created the largest supply disruption in the history of the oil market, beating the shocks of the 1970s and the war in Ukraine. Whatever happens with Donald Trump and the Strait of Hormuz, the Middle East oil industry cannot afford to be this exposed again. The Gulf has the money and […]
The UK has the lowest business investment of any G7 country. The last time its business investment stood above the G7 median as a proportion of GDP, John Major was Prime Minister. The Labour government’s instinct, both in its manifesto and in practice, reflects the old Keynesian mindset that “The duty of ordering the current […]
Youth unemployment is one of those issues that politicians across the spectrum agree is a scandal. The debate tends to focus on training programmes, welfare incentives, employer subsidies. These things matter. But a report published today by the Jobs Foundation points to something more fundamental: the businesses that would employ young people are not growing […]
The British investment industry wants everyone to be familiar with a cartoon squirrel. Savvy, the character fronting a 20 million pound advertising campaign, is the latest attempt to boost investment in the UK. The government-backed ‘Invest for the Future’ initiative, launched last Thursday, is supported by some of the biggest financial services firms in the […]
Disruption is what venture capitalists seek to do. Good disruption, that is. Investing in early-stage companies, creating jobs, backing innovation and technologies that can move a country, or perhaps a region of a country, forward. But there’s a catch: economic displacement. This happens when policy intervention that boosts economic activity in one location has the […]
This is the transcript of a speech delivered by the Shadow Secretary of State for Work and Pensions during the Commons debate on the Pension Schemes Bill on April 15, 2026. Who knew that the Pension Schemes Bill would become so controversial? It is a Bill on which there was so much consensus; a Bill […]
Monetary policy errors are rarely obvious in real time. More often, they emerge slowly – the product of frameworks that persist beyond the conditions that once justified them. Britain now risks drifting into precisely such a moment. The Bank of England spent the better part of two years extinguishing the most severe inflation shock in […]
During the Thatcher premiership, popular capitalism came to the fore, focused on boosting home ownership and broadening share participation. It was a period when the City was growing and finance was helping drive economic success, and there was a desire for more people to share in this. The Big Bang reforms of 1986 transformed London’s […]
So, never-here-Keir is on, by my counting, his 38th overseas trip since entering Downing Street. This time, it is to Communist China, in what must feel like something of a homecoming for Starmer. The Prime Minister has declared that this trip will make Britain richer, which is a surprising goal given he is doing seemingly […]
As much as I hate to admit it, there is a lot to like in the Government’s water white paper. But there’s a reason for that: the best ideas are lifted straight from the Conservative Party. Stripped of the hollow slogans and performative toughness about tackling sewage that have dominated the debate in recent years, […]
Britain has a long and proud history of innovation – stretching from the Agricultural and Industrial Revolutions right through to modern successes in the fintech and life sciences sectors. Unfortunately, in recent years another trend has emerged, of start-ups incubating ideas in the UK before listing their businesses overseas, primarily in the US. Of the […]
There has been a blizzard of important announcements for the future of the digital economy from the Competition and Markets authority in recent weeks. New investigations into search engines and mobile ecosystems, provisional findings from its long-running cloud market investigation, investigations into reviews. However, the regulator’s relationship with the Government has also become evidently strained, […]
With all the fuss about Labour’s ‘heat or eat’ decision to means-test pensioners for their winter fuel allowance, and the ‘did-she-or-didn’t-she’ media hyperventilation about Kemi Badenoch questioning the future of the pension triple lock, it’s easy to forget that Britain’s state pension is basically broke. It was set up when most people only lived a […]
CapX does not offer investment advice. This article is for information only. You are not guaranteed to make money from buying cryptocurrency and you may lose your entire investment. It is now almost 15 years since Satoshi Nakamoto announced his new invention, bitcoin, to the world. Since then, it has grown and grown. Following the […]
A newly elected government organises a global summit to encourage inward investment. Hypothetically, it would be sensible to include the world’s richest man on the invitation list, but it seems as if Elon Musk (estimated net worth: $270.5 billion) has been snubbed by the British Government and will be absent from the event in London […]
Brexiteers have long-argued for the need to restore control over Britain’s laws to the British Parliament and British courts. For too long, the Leavers argued, bureaucrats in Brussels had been tightening their grip on the UK statute book without rigorous accountability from the British people. Leaving the EU was supposed to change that. The Digital […]
The forthcoming Budget will be a seat-of-the-pants affair. Former Chancellor Sajid Javid handed his successor, the suave Rishi Sunak, an extraordinarily difficult balancing act: somehow, Sunak has to deliver on the implied promises made to those who voted Tory for the first time in the December election, while still paying lip service to the Government’s […]
Are we paying too much in aid? Too little? Do we spend it wisely? Could we do more? Our international aid budget provides a rich seam of debate amongst politicians, advisors and commentators – but all too rarely do those who have led HM Government’s work overseas get a role in the conversation. I have […]
The Conservatives’ unexpected success in breaking down the Red Wall gave Boris Johnson a surprise Christmas present. But it also presents him with an unexpected challenge – to make a real difference to the parts of the UK that successive Governments tended to forget. It’s a real opportunity to create a legacy where most people […]
“My Government’s priority” the Queen told us yesterday “is to deliver the United Kingdom’s departure from the European Union”. Let that sink in. For years, those of us who advocated leaving the EU were frequently demonised by the mainstream media. We were, it was routinely implied, extremist – indeed, xenophobic! – for wanting Britain to […]
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