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Duncan Weldon

@duncanweldon.bsky.social
26K followers 1.7K following 9.5K posts

Economics writer. Author. Expect history, economics, finance and other stuff. Some cricket. Wrote Two Hundred Years of Muddling Through. Blood and Treasure, on the economics of war, out now.

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Reposted by Duncan Weldon
Tony Tassell @tonytassell.bsky.social · 5h
Man City’s Emirati chair was granted diplomatic immunity 6 yrs ago in a move that could complicate any legal action resulting from findings that the club artificially inflated its finances by more than £900mn - scoop by Caroline Binham @journosooz.bsky.social as.ft.com/r/d717fb9e-2...
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Duncan Weldon @duncanweldon.bsky.social · 1h
The most useful word in financial journalism is ‘as’. ‘Markets did x as y happened’ almost always works.
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Duncan Weldon @duncanweldon.bsky.social · 1h
The silver living, to a very big cloud, if you’re sitting in HMT today is that amid a global bond sell off gilts aren’t being hit the hardest. Which feels a bit different to other recent sell offs.
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Duncan Weldon @duncanweldon.bsky.social · 2h
Lots to think about here. Three immediate thoughts - cepr.org/voxeu/column...
cepr.org
Global imbalances and the China challenge
China's trade surplus is widening, its manufactured exports are surging, and the political backlash is intensifying. This column argues that the widening trade surplus reflects not just macroeconomic ...
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Duncan Weldon @duncanweldon.bsky.social · 3h
2010s macro policy discussion was dominated by talk of interest rate floors. The 2020s are more about ceilings.
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Duncan Weldon @duncanweldon.bsky.social · 18h
Seized control of the television.
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Duncan Weldon @duncanweldon.bsky.social · 21h
405 against India is outrageous in an ODI.
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Toby Nangle @tobyn.bsky.social · 23h
We've reverted to pre-Whatever-It-Takes spread levels
10yr France yield minus 10yr Germany govt bond yield.
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Gaby Hinsliff @gabyhinsliff.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
such a good eg of why political argument matters - polling previously showed over 60% support for keeping triple lock. Argue to unlock it *for something people also want* & numbers can change. (Obv can change back again if someone makes a good argument against, but either way, politics=argument)
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Duncan Weldon @duncanweldon.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
www.bbc.co.uk/sport/cricke... Would just be incredibly petty if the ECB said no.
If Stokes wants to play for Durham, or signs a contract that includes any white-ball cricket in the T20 Blast or One-Day Cup, he would need a special No-Objection Certificate (NOC) from the ECB to play in a franchise league that clashes with domestic competitions for which they are contracted.
And the ECB has previously refused NOCs to former England players who have wanted to pursue freelance T20 careers.
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Economic History Society @echistsoc.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
Between 1995 and 2004, the percentage of English children who were defined as ‘obese’ increased from 12% to 19%, and the share has remained between 14% and 17% since 2008. These trends bring worrying implications for potentially life-threatening diseases, such as cancer and type-2 diabetes.
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Duncan Weldon @duncanweldon.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
Circa 2017/18 some large corporates I spoke to (sectors: manufacturing/finance/professional services) indicted that if Labour offered them single market access they could put up with quite a lot in the way of tax and regulation. The trade-off was worth it. Wondering if this is still the case?
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Duncan Weldon @duncanweldon.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
I’d say the optimistic case now is: 1. There’s already some momentum. 2. UK rates start from a more restrictive position than US or Euro ones; less tightening ahead. 3. Maybe, just maybe?, it looks like European gas markets have gone a bit overboard and there’s some relief ahead.
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Duncan Weldon @duncanweldon.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
Starmer but with better TikTok arguments aging poorly today.
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Andy Bruce (Reuters) @bruceandy.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
🥳 UK economy grew more than thought in the second quarter. • GDP +0.5% qq versus a previous estimate of +0.4% (same with GDP per head) • Strong business investment growth (see 👇) • Current account balance (exc. precious metals) smallest in 5 years at 1% of GDP thanks to services exports
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Duncan Weldon @duncanweldon.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
What even is the point of doing a perfect tricky bit of parallel parking if the only person in the car with you is a child who can’t drive and won’t praise it?
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Duncan Weldon @duncanweldon.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
The problem is that these vary from really quite minor to outrageous. www.bbc.co.uk/sport/cricke...
bbc.co.uk
Test cricket's biggest scandals: Rank BBC Sport's top 10
As memories of sandpapergate are rekindled by Australia's upcoming tour of South Africa, rank the biggest scandals in Test cricket's history.
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Duncan Weldon @duncanweldon.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
The actually refreshing bit about the Burnham speech is that he seems up for an argument, making a case and trying to convince people of something. Even acknowledged that trade-offs are a thing.
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Duncan Weldon @duncanweldon.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
Drop the triple lock/create a national care service is a proper policy offer. But I am slightly confused about setting out a manifesto for 2028/29 in late 2026 with years of governing still to go.
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Duncan Weldon @duncanweldon.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
That’s about one third of the UK vehicle stock.
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Duncan Weldon @duncanweldon.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
Thinking back to the post-Venezuela, Greenland sabre-rattling when we were told about the Donroe doctrine and how the US would now concentrate on the Western hemisphere. Feels a very long time ago. Given that whole seven months and counting war in the Middle East thing.
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Duncan Weldon @duncanweldon.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
Glad I decided to try and find out if El Niño would make for a colder or a warmer British winter.
The so-called Big Freeze of winter 2009/2010 was, at the time, the coldest in three decades - and this coincided with an El Niño.
However, 2006/2007 was also an El Niño winter and that was unseasonably warm.
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Duncan Weldon @duncanweldon.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
I’m actually not against commissions/reviews as a tool of policy. But they work much better as a way of building consensus around difficult issues than they do at actually finding novel solutions.
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Duncan Weldon @duncanweldon.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
If you are going to end the triple lock, you’re better off just ending it. Talking about a process of maybe ending it in the next Parliament, following some sort of review, feels like a way of minimising the fiscal saving while maximising the political pain.
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Duncan Weldon @duncanweldon.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
Maybe I’m a Luddite on these things. But I’m always quite cautious about any financing structure that involves multiple hard to read circular flow charts. www.ft.com/content/d6a9... Nvidia turns to insurers to spread the risk of AI build-out
ft.com
Nvidia turns to insurers to spread the risk of AI build-out
World’s largest listed company looks for new ways to draw Wall Street deeper into the financing of the AI boom
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Reposted by Duncan Weldon
Lee Savage @leesavage.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
AI is a complementary technology. It's going to take a few years for employers to fully grasp this as they try to replace workers with LLMs, but they'll get there eventually
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Duncan Weldon @duncanweldon.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
Could be a diesel export ban. Could be renaming another lake. You never know.
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David Bent @davidbent.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
"As an...economic historian...I know that “anything that can be mass-produced will fall in price dramatically when it is mass produced”....And yet I forgot it." @timleunig.bsky.social on battery prices & path to Net Zero. So. Many. People. Make. This. Mistake. timleunig.substack.com/p/i-was-wrong
timleunig.substack.com
I was wrong
And what I learned from it.
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Katie Martin @katie0martin.ft.com · 28/09/2026
really nice FT Big Read today on the biggest shake-up in financial markets that not enough people know about: www.ft.com/content/00f9...
ft.com
AI hyperscalers are transforming debt
The sector’s huge capital needs are forcing companies and countries to rethink how they borrow money
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Duncan Weldon @duncanweldon.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
Superb and fascinating chart.
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Stephen Bush @stephenkb.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
This one raises a fascinating philosophical question: if you list your flat for £200k more than it is worth, have you really listed it, or are you just posting pictures of your home's interior online?
Georgia Dean and her husband recently took their property off the market.

He bought the two-bedroom flat in Haggerston, east London, for £470,000 in 2014. But the mortgage rate was due to rise from 1.6 per cent to 4.8 per cent: renting the flat out no longer made financial sense.

They listed it in June for £650,000, a below-inflation increase. An estate agent told them “no one would sniff around if the price stayed above £600,000”, said Dean, who works in product at a tech start-up.

In the two months before the couple pulled the listing, it attracted only two viewings.
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Giles Wilkes @gilesyb.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
'Where a typical industrial product might have a few dozen suppliers, an ASML EUV has more than 100,000 parts provided by 200 principal suppliers and 2,000 companies overall." giftarticle.ft.com/giftarticle/... Industrial strategy so much harder than monetary policy, Exhibit LXIB
giftarticle.ft.com
ASML chief: ‘There is only one company making those machines’
Christophe Fouquet has built Europe’s biggest business through a total monopoly over the most advanced chipmaking equipment
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Left Outside @leftoutside.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
Last decade has also seen a lot of oppression-biased technological change.
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Duncan Weldon @duncanweldon.bsky.social · 27/09/2026
In the happy place.
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Duncan Weldon @duncanweldon.bsky.social · 27/09/2026
Ah. The unexpected uber/over running engineering works stage of getting to the cricket on a Sunday. Love the train system.
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Duncan Weldon @duncanweldon.bsky.social · 26/09/2026
Good. www.theguardian.com/politics/202...
theguardian.com
Andy Burnham announces new homes scheme for first-time buyers
Exclusive: Policy initiative for England will help more young people on to property ladder, prime minister tells Guardian
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Duncan Weldon @duncanweldon.bsky.social · 26/09/2026
Another datapoint in my continuing campaign: people should have hobbies.
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Daniel Knowles @dlknowles.bsky.social · 26/09/2026
Some unintended consequences I suspect the rise of AI agents will create: 1. Restaurants that only take reservations by hand written letter, or more likely, don't take them at all. 2. Gigs where you can only buy tickets in person. 3. Businesses that operate without websites.
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Katie Martin @katie0martin.ft.com · 26/09/2026
This shitshow in bonds is the perfect environment for an accident. Fun! Me, 300 free clicks Bond ructions point to new danger zone in markets - as.ft.com/r/95199679-b...
as.ft.com
Bond ructions point to new danger zone in markets
Sell-offs of this scale and speed have the potential to light fires in other parts of the financial system
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Hetan Shah @hetanshah.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
Wow I’ve never seen this photo before. The two figures from American Gothic (who turn out to be the family dentist and the artist’s sister!) www.ft.com/content/6015...
The artist's sister Nan Wood Graham and dentist Dr Byron Henry pose with the painting in 1942 © Image courtesy of the Figge Art Museum, City of Davenport Art Collection, Grant Wood Archive, Friends of Art Acquisition Fund, SB-4
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Duncan Weldon @duncanweldon.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
Once again, I am reminding people that I did not write the list. And also noting that it is ok for people to like different things. And watching very little TV is fine. And watching a lot of TV is also fine. It’s all fine.
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Isaiah Bishop @isaiahbishop.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
I would treat this as credible. but remember all the detail issues this ran into last time
aljazeera.com
Iran pitches seven-day roadmap to end conflict with US
Tehran seeks rapid implementation failed ceasefire deal, offering to open Hormuz if regional conflicts halted.
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Duncan Weldon @duncanweldon.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
Boston Legal should be on the list.
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Duncan Weldon @duncanweldon.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
Please do not be angry with me about the list. I did not write the list.
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Duncan Weldon @duncanweldon.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
I’ve seen 64 of the NYT’s best 100 TV shows of the 21st century. And don’t really disagree with the inclusion of any of those. That’s a good hit rate.
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Duncan Weldon @duncanweldon.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
Lots of good pieces on the ONS productivity stuff over the last week. But I think the really big takeaway is that we should all (including me) be more questioning of the quality of the data when a country is a huge global outlier and there is no obvious reason why it should be.
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Rhymer Rigby @rhymerrigby.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
I recorded an audiobook last week. It was quite an interesting experience - basically like reading the longest bedtime story ever. Here are 7 seven things I learned. rhymerrigby.substack.com/p/seven-thin...
rhymerrigby.substack.com
Seven things I learned recording an audiobook
For those of you who don’t know, I have a book coming out on the 29th of October. This is called The TV MBA and is about the business and career lessons to be found in pop culture - if you've ever won...
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Duncan Weldon @duncanweldon.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
Is it 1990s nostalgia if I’m fed up with a using a trackpad and browsing mouse options?
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Andy Bruce (Reuters) @bruceandy.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
UK consumer confidence has hit a more than two-year high, according to GfK, symbolised below by the purchase of mangoes. Another bit of generally positive sentiment data. YouGov/Cebr and LSEG/Ipsos surveys have also shown rising consumer morale this month. www.reuters.com/world/uk/uk-...
reuters.com
UK consumer confidence hits more than two-year high in September, GfK says
British consumer confidence unexpectedly struck a more than two-year high this month as households ​grew more optimistic about their personal finances, ‌according to a survey on Friday that added to r...
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Duncan Weldon @duncanweldon.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
Can’t believe no one has ever thought of the idea of selling us hot food. I, for one, am both excited and, if I’m honest, a little apprehensive about the idea of warm food. www.ft.com/content/bdb6... Subway rival bets hot sandwiches will sell in UK’s ‘cold and rain’
US sandwich maker Jersey Mike’s is launching an ambitious expansion plan in the UK, with its billionaire founder betting that “the cold and the rain” in Britain will push consumers to embrace the brand’s hot subs.
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