JAK

1945: Russia demands, and is ceded, the Prussian capital Königsberg...... to the victors, go the spoils.

I've been in the room during simulations, when officials are asked to theorise what would happen if country X stopped exporting for one reason or another. You would be surprised how many spout out the typical, first order, response of oh, that wouldn't affect us, as we buy from country Y... The whole idea that there is arbitrage / fungibility, and that there might suddenly be competition for country Y's exports seems to go over some people's heads. I doubt the EU would join a ban, it would be a bridge too far to suddenly remove 13% of global net exports from the global market. Also, in general, people/voters are idiots. The same person who virtue signals about Ukraine on Twitter/FB today, will go out tomorrow and burn an effigy of Macron at a yellow vest protest because of high fuel prices. So on the one hand, you might have French people pushing Macron to ban Russian oil, but on the other hand, rural voters might actually vote for pro-Putin Marine Le Pen, if fuel prices go up.

Agree with Gregmal here. I didn't see the point of premium vodka either, but a Russian mate introduced me to Beluga, and changed my mind. I do think it is worth the extra few rubles. He recommended drinking it from the freezer. I've heard others call that sacrilege. But to each their own. Never tried Gold though. Polished off the last of a bottle of Beluga Transatlantic a few days back.

SWMA

Sadly, I think Barley prices (in Europe at least), are linked to wheat prices. Malting barley futures for 2022 were already higher than in 2021 heading into 2022 due to elevated fertiliser / energy prices etc. And European brewers are already talking about raising prices. Issues with Ukraine / Russia may just fan the flames. At least that's what I'm going to tell my wife when I place my next bulk beer order.

Not directly related, but the thread above reminds me of an afternoon killing time in a bar in Baku, Azerbaijan a few years back. Got talking to the barman. He asked me if I wanted to buy some Soviet Rubles as a souvenir. I asked him if her preferred the old days, or independence. He said under the Soviets he was a good engineer, and he got paid a little extra by his bosses for being good at his job. However, under the new regime, the good jobs were reserved for friends of those in power, so you needed someone to pull strings for you. He didn't know anyone, so lost his job and ended up working minimum wage in a bar, selling Roubles, other souvenirs, and I swear, what seemed like household products from inside his jacket, on the sly to make ends meet. Thought it was interesting, as an outsider, it might seem like the choice would be about politics, independence, or ideology, or "freedom", but to him, that was academic, the old system allowed him to put more bread on his table, and it was fairer too. Again, not directly comparable, Azerbaijan, was definitely more frying pan to fire, than Ukraine. Just thought it was interesting. Not often you get the on-the-ground perspective on things.

Thanks for the clarification. The 10k figure just stuck me as a large amount, if those were individual currencies, given a lot of the noise about crypto (at least to this uninformed observer whose only information to date has been reading Twitter fights between opponents / proponents for pure entertainment) is that unlike Fiat, the supply of BTC is capped... of course, as you say, just because there are 10k coins, doesn't mean all 10k would be accepted. Also, I had thought about YOLO'ing some lottery type money into some random coins. I think my Revolut account has maybe 20, as an asymmetric bet on the odds of one of them going 1000X. But if €5 on each would mean €50k rather than €100, then I might have to reconsider that idea. Again, no idea about crypto, and don't want to divert the thread into a discussion about it! Was just curious if there are 10k individual currencies in existence !

Excuse the complete ignorance here, but "#9922 market rank".... Are there almost 10k crypto currencies in current circulation i.e. one potential entire crypto currency per 2100 bitcoin? That's nuts.

The completely agree with the need to avoid corruption / insider trading. The cases involving profits from legislation and stock prices swings seem extremely corrupt, and should be eliminated somehow. However, I wonder if a complete ban on skin-in-the-game would be counterproductive, as you could end up with politicians enacting laws which penalise others for making money in a manner they themselves do not, or at least, do not understand. By way of example, in Ireland, where politicians are far less wealthy (single digit millionaires, mainly in the form of rental properties. Few politicians own stocks or ETFs of any significance outside non-taxable pensions), we have been saddled with a ridiculous ETF tax since 2006 (41% exit tax vs. 33% capital gains on individual stocks. Worse, the exit tax applies every 8 years, even if the ETFs were not sold, aka "deemed disposal"). This law wasn't introduced by some left-wing radicals, but by centrist parties. In addition, the current Minister for Finance recently defended it as ensuring that "income cannot be rolled up indefinitely in the fund without being taxed" - the fact that it applies to distributing ETFs whose income is actually taxed annually i.e. just like income from rental properties (which aren't subject to deemed disposal on appreciating house prices), seems to have gone over his head..... So it appears that, due to lack of skin-in-the-game, Irish politicians are completely ignorant of the inconsistencies in the tax regime, and what they are actually taxing. Ironic, as a good chunk of European ETFs are domiciled in Dublin, so they wouldn't have to walk far for a tutorial. I suspect if they actually had active, taxable, stock portfolios, this situation wouldn't arise (though it is investment culture, rather than laws, that are currently constraining them from having them).

Briefly lived in Korea circa 2017. Went hiking a lot when I was there. Hikes are usually followed by gallons of chicken and beer. During one of those post hike sessions, I got talking to a local stockbroker. The only stock tip he gave me was Nvidia, which he randomly spouted before passing out in the seat next to me. Although I vividly remembered the stock tip, due to the mental bias of associating it with drunken buffoonery, I subconsciously refused to even look into it. Expensive lesson !