All we like sheep!

Above, an excellent rendition of We All like sheep. Life nowadays has a certain predictability about it. A predictability to be welcomed however. Yesterday was Sunday, and for me that meant walking to the local C of E church – I was raised a Methodist and my family can be said to be steeped in Methodism, but I prefer to walk to Sunday morning service and not drive so I attend the Anglican church as it is within a short walking distance.
The church is experiencing what the Anglicans call an interregnum – their vicar retired and a new one had been appointed but in the meantime the services are taken by retired and visiting clergy. Yesterday’s service was taken by a very pleasant chap called Tony Seymour and his sermon drew on the readings one of which was Mark 10: 17-31 which as most British Gazette readers will know is the story of the the rich young man and the famous verse 25 – the “Eye of the Needle.”
The Rev. Seymour made mention of the stock market and this caused me to smile.
There are many who like to suggest that everybody has to do a St. Francis of Assisi and give away all worldly goods, but the passage in Mark is all about ends and means and the means must not become an end in itself: “Don’t make money your God.”
As we move inexorably to the close of the year we will soon be into the season where Handle’s oratorio Messiah is to be heard and enjoyed.
Also at this time we have the annual repetition of Charles Dickens Masterpiece, “Christmas Carol.”
The character Scrooge is a most excellent – and extreme – example at what Mark 10 was all about: Scrooge had made the acquisition of wealth the “be all and end all of his existence” and Marley did him an inestimable good turn by arranging for the visitation of the three spirits.
Most people are not like Scrooge. He is a literary invention of an extreme example. But people do have a tendency to follow a herd instinct towards a path of perceived self enrichment when they see it. This is after all how stock market bubbles come about. People see someone doing something that appears to either make money or has the prospect of so doing and emulate this. Often, they don’t sit down and analyse the situation and make a more considered decision.
Doubtless British Gazette readers will recall the famous verse 6 in Isaiah 53:
“All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all.”
– when they follow the link below about a quarter of a million people registering an interest in the Lloyds Public Offering.
GOTO: http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/news/article-3267404/Now-250-000-prospective-shareholders-registered-Lloyds.html
British Gazette readers will also smile with wry scepticism at the reports that George Osborne has instructed HM Treasury to continue selling down the bulk of it’s shareholding in the run up to PO.
GOTO: http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/markets/article-3266080/UK-Government-sells-1-stake-Lloyds-Banking-cutting-holding-11-gears-big-retail-offering.html
What George Osborne is of course doing is to sell off large chunks of Lloyds Bank to the Tories friends in the City at prices around 76 and 77 pence a share. When HM Treasury is down to it’s last £2 billion or so this will end and the price will start to climb. This will accelerate up to the PO and will continue to rise afterwards.
Of course, British Gazette readers who are interested in investing in Lloyds Bank will doubtless do what your Editor has done and to buy now – before the price goes up!
Of course, “the sheep” are waiting for their 5% discount blissfully not realising that the SP at the PO will be more than 76 or 66 pence + 5%! The PO will resemble the rush of the Gadarene Swine! As stated earlier, it is this sort of behaviour that leads to such as the South Sea bubble!
It is doubly depressing for British Gazette readers who will be fully aware of the British Public’s herd like tendencies and fear that they will follow the siren calls of the “IN” campaigners – ably assisted by their colleagues in the Brussels Brainwashing Commissariat – at the forthcoming EU referendum.
About the PO – your Editor had intended to take part on a very minor level – a couple of hundred pounds – merely to take part; but has decided not to bother.