May 27, 2014

The only bubble our young unemployed really need is the one really absent, having been prohibited by bank regulators.

Sir, Patrick Jenkins writes “There are other bubbles out there beyond UK house prices” May 27. He is of course right. But in the same way that a stress test on banks should not only include what is on their balance sheets but also what is not, an inventory of bubbles should also analyze the absent bubbles.

And in this respect let me assure you that the most conspicuously absent bubble, in the UK, in Europe and largely in America too, is the one our young unemployed most needs, and I refer to the “Medium and small businesses entrepreneurs and start-ups” bubble. That is the bubble that has been prohibited by the risk-weighted capital requirements for banks imposed by our dangerously risky risk adverse bank regulators.

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