Could Ireland be facing another recession? - Eddie Hobbs thinks so!

Liberty_Bear

Nowhere did I see a similar thread so I posted this one (at least one that directly looked at this). Eddie Hobbs (of Brendan Investments losing €13m fame) has raised his head above the parapet to detail why Ireland may be on a slide towards recession. I will let the Mirror pick it up

https://www.rsvplive.ie/news/irish-news/eddie-hobbs-says-ireland-firestorm-27232258

“Stagflation is when the inflation rate is running well above the economic growth rate. What that basically means is costs are rising faster than the economy is growing.

“Workers have no chance of recovering the losses they’re experiencing against inflation. They just can’t. People automatically go backwards. You’re in reverse gear.”

However, house prices won’t crash as they did in the last recession.

“The Central Bank has its foot on the throat of the credit under-writing in Ireland. Prices will flatten by 10% to 15% maybe, but that’s more to do with ‘demand destruction’ which is when they’ve squeezed it and there’s no-one left who can afford those prices.

--

House prices falling by 10-15%

Wages not rising to keep abreast the cost of living

Not being able to fill jobs at the moment is less money for the exchequer

A lot of us here got through the last recession , what will it cost us this time?

Everlong1

Has he not been discredited? Is David McWilliams not our economic guru now?

https://www.reuters.com/markets/europe/irish-economy-shrank-1-first-three-months-qq-2022-06-03/

the domestic econmy is well on its way,its pure quiet in work compared to last year even

Alot to be said for more severe government involvement and bringing in price controls across the board tbh,lot of placess are jumping on bandwagon and pricing emselves out of the market

mikemac2

He told his client the Limerick lottery winner to buy property in derelict Detroit and lost a fortune 🙄

Anyone here buy in Cape Verde? Has been discredited for years.

The thread is Politics forum is interesting and has much the same conclusion without the drama. Is a good read

Subzero3

People need to rise up. There should be Anarchy they wat things are going.

Liberty_Bear

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119202742#Comment_119202742

Mc Williams was laughed at when he said the last Celtic Tiger was coming to an end

Thought there is this...https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6gWPmufcOTo

Yurt2

Eddie Hobbs is a fruitcake

Snugbugrug28

Eddie says it is so it isn't. The only thing he ever did right was call out the republic as a rip-off.

bigroad

Eddie should stay quiet and stop looking into his crystal ball .

Boggles

The crank couldn't predict Noon at 11:45.

Absolute simpleton.

Jim2007

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058250218/could-ireland-be-facing-another-recession-eddie-hobbs-thinks-so

If you are still following this clown, perhaps you'd be interested in a couple of black helicopters and bridge I'm looking to clear, going cheap.

Liberty_Bear

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119202825#Comment_119202825

Your stellar contributions are noted as per usual and are up there with Julien Mercile, Mc Williams and Stiiglitz. You sir should be mandatory reading on an Uni course

But getting back to the topic - regardless of what Eddie (of Brendan Investments losing €13m fame - did you not pick up on that) , are their signifiers for us heading to recession?

elperello

Listen to Eddie and David and anyone else who is holding forth on the economic prediction front and then take a deep breath and make your own decision.

Word of warning, it's a jungle out there.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119202808#Comment_119202808

Given that recessions are pretty much an inevitability in the economy, I guess you can't blame economists for making a prediction that's almost certain to happen.

Liberty_Bear

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119202963#Comment_119202963

Nail on the head mate - at the most basic of levels there is some truth in what economists are saying (even if they lose 13 mil with Brendan Investments)

Wages have not kept up with inflation - we cant save nor can we afford the basics or just about

Yurt2

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119202973#Comment_119202973

Eddie is not and never was a trained economist (a profession that badly could do with being a protected job title), though he often attempted to package himself as one.

He worked in marketing for Irish Life for about a dozen years. He is, at heart, a marketing spoofer.

54and56

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119202973#Comment_119202973

Spot on Liberty, Eddie Cape Verde Hobbs predicting an imminent recession when the inflation genie is out of the bottle and interest rates are rising is about as insightful as a blind man predicting there will be a sunrise tomorrow.

The really challenging question to answer is how long and how deep will the recession be?

Liberty_Bear

Impossible to guess, the housing market is the keystone here in the problem. No affordable housing for families, homeless, immigrants, council list or those who are coming for work. No one can buy or rent.

Mad_maxx

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119202825#Comment_119202825

Hobbs is an idiot but at least unlike you, he doesn't hide whatever useful advice he might very occasionally have like a Cavan man hides his dinner in a drawer

newmember2

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058250218/could-ireland-be-facing-another-recession-eddie-hobbs-thinks-so

"Nowhere did I see a similar thread..."

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058247155/a-global-recession-is-on-the-horizon

no?

Liberty_Bear

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119203512#Comment_119203512

Too generalist - its about a global recession

Cdemess

Playing with other peoples money

entrepreneurs is a great buzz word.

sarah Newman was calling herself an entrepreneur too

54and56

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119203530#Comment_119203530

In fairness if you judge an Entrepreneur by the value they create and manage to personally extract then Sarah Newman ticked the box with NeedAHotel.com which she started from scratch and sold for €60m according to the Indo.

The fact she somehow manged to piss it all away on bad investments and other poor decisions is a cautionary tale but doesn't erase the fact that she was a successful entrepreneur.

Cdemess

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119203615#Comment_119203615

True, But she had it and lost it all. It’s all a gamble.

Jim_Hodge

Time to relax so if Eddie says something it's time to do the opposite. He hasn't a clue.

54and56

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119203649#Comment_119203649

Correct but she ticked the successful entrepreneur box pretty well, not many exit at such a valuation.

The successful investor and people judgement boxes she completely failed to tick unfortunately.

touts

The world wide numbers are very poor. Recession seems to be the best possible result at the moment.

But Eddie Hobbs is just repeating what most finance publications etc have been shouting about for a coupe of months now. He has been proven as a charlatan who just repeats the work of others and as in the buy property in Detroit fiasco he is incapable of analysis of the numbers in front of him.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119202759#Comment_119202759

Wat thing? We, da peepl need ta no wat we r risn up agenst. Ta n advns.

Everlong1

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119203888#Comment_119203888

DA GOVVAMINT BUD !

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119203942#Comment_119203942

No, no, no. It’s Da Gubberment. Da Gubberment.

Liberty_Bear

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119203869#Comment_119203869

Looking at the Irish figures - the unemployment rate at the moment is hovering around 5%, it was around 4.98% in 2007 just before the crisis hit . Rising costs will find people living on the breadline. At a minimum some of the parties are calling for a rise to 12.90 an hour from 10.50 (22% pay rise). Collectively rents have risen much faster, 8% alone last year .

Subzero3

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119203888#Comment_119203888

The government walking us into this disaster. Let the lefty flag wavers move over to Ukriane.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119203961#Comment_119203961

Do the eegits not know that increasing minimum wage = increased costs😤

Liberty_Bear

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119204011#Comment_119204011

US States paid 15 dollars an hour and the cost of living didnt increase....

54and56

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119204057#Comment_119204057

No inflation in the US?

Yurt2

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119204005#Comment_119204005

As if the Irish government had it's levers on anything that could have been done to prevent the current circumstances.

'Lefty flag wavers'

People across the political spectrum are appalled at the invasion of Ukraine, and understand the dangers to the European peace in letting Putin get away with it.

Yurt2

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119204011#Comment_119204011

Someone has never taken an economics course.

Liberty_Bear

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119204084#Comment_119204084

Two are seperate. Inflation drives wages down as companies seek to cut costs and this is usually done through redundancy. Wages are also impacted that the more money that is given then the bigger the liablity for tax. Its happening in the UK. Inflation is what..4%? Wages fell on average about 2-3% . Rather than thinking of wages driving inflation, its the other way around - inflation is driving wages (down)

Liberty_Bear

https://www.theguardian.com/money/2022/jun/14/uk-pay-falling-inflation-energy-bills-unemployment

54and56

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119204170#Comment_119204170

If inflation drove wages down the data below wouldn't exist. Nowhere has wage inflation been negative i.e. you get paid less next month/year than last month/year. I'm using UK data as they collect it and make it available, can't find similar for Ireland but this is a global issue and whilst countries will differ depending on their own economic circumstances the pattern and trend between the UK and Ireland is broadly similar. If anything their general inflation is worse than ours partly due to Brexit and partly due to Sterling deflating making imports so much more expensive.

For most of the time period 2015 to 2022 wage inflation exceeded general inflation making workers better off in real terms but for the last year wage inflation (wages are still increasing just not as much as general inflation) has lagged general inflation and may continue to do so as businesses struggle maintain competitiveness but the lines may well invert again if (hopefully) general inflation starts to trend downwards.

Liberty_Bear

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119205641#Comment_119205641

Thats a fair comment but I didnt explain what I mean with enough clarity. Inflation does not drive down the wages per se - I could earn 10.50 per hour this year and 11 euro an hour the next year. It is driven down by both taxes and the average wage for jobs lowers as the mean figure for what is paid per head of population shrinks as companies offer less to keep the same profit margins . Above the Guardian article showed wages dropping by 3.4 %. In Ireland we had the pensionlevy on civil servants which reduced wages slowly.

54and56

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119207230#Comment_119207230

Ah ok, I think (I'm neither an expert or trying to be patronising) that what you're referring to is the effect inflation has on purchasing power.

If you earn €1 today it gets you a cup of coffee. If you get a 5% pay rise so tomorrow you earn €1.05 but coffee has increased 10% to €1.10 although you're earning more in nominal terms you're actually able to purchase less with it so the real world impact is you can't buy as much with your increased wages. That, as far as I can remember from my days studying economics, is referred to as a reduction in real world purchasing power and that's why, despite wages actually increasing, people experience a reduction in what they get for those wages.

The long terms solution is to force inflation down rather than incur permanent increases in input costs but the problem with that is employees get squeezed while the inflation remains higher than wage increases.

TrudiGlenn

Exactly, in fact I dont think Eddie has any economic or financial qualifications at level 8 or 9 on the NFQ, he probably studied them for the Leaving Cert. He would have that (in my opinion) disgraceful certificate QFA (Qualified Financial Advisor) at one point was a multiple choice 3 hoyr test.

People are being fooled by this QFA Certificate, it should be named Qualified to sell Insurance.

Donald Trump

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119217384#Comment_119217384

A three hoor test you say?

Sounds like a fun Sunday afternoon

Where can I sign up?

ittakestwo

I think this recession will be different from the last. I dont think it will result in a rise in unemployment. I think unemployment will stay surprisingly low. But GDP will fall in two consecutive quarter so will beca recession. Actually i think a slow down in the economy is needed.

Atlantic Dawn

Thing is we could build here for 30 years at a profit, having the mortgages at one of the highest rates in the EU leaves the place uncompetitive. No political party seems willing to enact legislation where a freeloader who hasn't put €1 toward their mortgage in 2 years does not get fooked out on their hole. The many are paying for the fooked up few, proper banana republic.

riclad

Inflation is increasing. The stock market is down, supply chain is in crisis, oil is expensive, price of energy going up. The long tech boom is over People will reduce spending on cafes, luxury goods, going out less, so it does not take a genius to forecast a recession. The only question is how long it will last, are we facing a permanent rise in energy prices.

jmcc

It seems that Eddie Hobbs is latching on to a wider sentiment. That does not mean that he is right or wrong. Some economic problems can show up first in domain name registrations with increasing non-renewals of domain names and abandonment of websites. These registration and usage patterns can form a good proxy for consumer sentiment and economic conditions. This is based on observation of gTLD (.COM/NET/ORG etc) domain name data rather than in-depth economic knowledge. There is some data published by published by ICANN but it is contractually delayed by three months so those outside the domain name industry won't see that data for June until October or so. It is also cumulative and lacks the necessary granularity, on its own, to track economic trends.

The problem is that large gTLDs like .COM (approximately 161 million) have global markets so it is necessary to analyse them on national/county basis. However, for the US, the .COM is its de facto country code TLD (ccTLD). The .IE is Ireland's ccTLD and the .UK is the UK's ccTLD. The .COM went into negative growth (had a net loss of domain names) in May (first of May figures compared with first of June figures).

There were record numbers of new registrations for 2020 and 2021 due to Covid and people trying to launch businesses online. Many of these optimistic registrations are now washing out of the gTLDs and some ccTLDs. Because domain name registrations run on a yearly basis and have readily accessible registration dates, it is possible to track them from registration, to development (a very difficult thing to measure) and to renewal or non-renewal. The problem is in separating the abnormal effects of the Covid economic measures from current economic conditions that are caused by the war in Ukraine.

Two things may be happening simultaneously. The first is economies adjusting to a post-Covid situation. The second is the effect of the war in the Ukraine on supply chains and costs. But for Eddie Hobbs and others in the media, the word "recession" gets them attention.

Regards...jmcc

Liberty_Bear

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119218442#Comment_119218442

That is what I am worried about in the grand scheme of things - long term there will be an increase on energy. In Spain my house mate was telling me that the prices are capped for the moment to stop the rise of energy costs. If I buy a gaff then solar panels will be the order of the day. Help me save a fortune in the long term

Varik

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119204057#Comment_119204057

California is now 15 for large companies only, but all those other states that agreed on it haven't actually done it yet with some planning to only hit that in 2027