sasguru soon to be living next to doleys...

[TestMangler]

Ahhh Im sorry you sold them .....

Buying shares in banks is the safest thing anyone can do. The government will never ever let any big banks fold. Many banks have gone under, but something like HBOS crashing in to the wall would be disasterous ...

Im still kicking myself I didnt get a loan, sell my family or anything else to raise funds years ago .....

Except that HBOS shares went from somewhere in the region of £10/£11 to 28p in the space of a few weeks. That didn't work out very 'safe' for anyone. I know people who'd worked at Halifax for years and dumped all their bonuses and savings into share options, some racking up 1/4 mil or so over their careers. It all got wiped out in 2008.

[Fred Bloggs]

Except that HBOS shares went from somewhere in the region of £10/£11 to 28p in the space of a few weeks. That didn't work out very 'safe' for anyone. I know people who'd worked at Halifax for years and dumped all their bonuses and savings into share options, some racking up 1/4 mil or so over their careers. It all got wiped out in 2008.

Wow! That must hurt. And now LLoyds is firing them. There's me feeling down trodden and hard done by too........... Not any more, thankfully.

[wim121]

Except that HBOS shares went from somewhere in the region of £10/£11 to 28p in the space of a few weeks. That didn't work out very 'safe' for anyone. I know people who'd worked at Halifax for years and dumped all their bonuses and savings into share options, some racking up 1/4 mil or so over their careers. It all got wiped out in 2008.

Indeed it doesnt sound good.

But it is safe. It may have suffered a set back, but that's sahres, they go up and down and they will go back up. The major banks didnt fold. Prices will recover. As for investors buying at the low share price point, kerrrrrrr-chingg!

But looking back over the past hundred years or more, we have had a predictable boom and bust cycle. Most people saw this coming. In fact I was expecting a crash somewhere around 2005, since 2001. That's why I took out a tracker morgage and informed the halifax bank manager what was going to happen when they thought I would be better off on a fixed rate, because strangely he predicted rising rates.

Anyway long point short .... Those shares will bounce back. If you are going to hold shares long term, you have to wait till they are at the peak till selling. Yes they crashed, but they're climbing. I can assure you they will be back up to £11 a share. Just a question of when.

Im expecting the next boom to start in 2015, maybe reaching its peak by 2020-2025. The cycle will never die because of one predictable part of humanity. Greed and envy masqueraded and hidden by generousity. We always want a better lifestyle than we are economically entitled to. Keeping up with the Jones's, yet we want to save the world, adopt a panda bear and absolve responsibility by throwing money in to a collection bucket. We are all materialistic in one way or another, you have to be unless you are a hippy.

[TestMangler]

Wow! That must hurt. And now LLoyds is firing them. There's me feeling down trodden and hard done by too........... Not any more, thankfully.

Anyone with any sense/length of service took VR from there two or three years ago. Some are back as contractors clawing their losses back from their employee share scheme.

Seems funny though that their strategic review says they need rid of 15000 bodies but they're spunking 10 Mil a month on Accidenture and a couple of other consultancy firms to produce power point packs about how bad the integration programme is and at least two agencies i know of are trying to find people constantly for contract roles (today included).

Permie confusion = contractor happiness.

[xoggoth]

I never figured out what SAS was about anyway. I suspect it was just something somebody made up to make money out of, like exorcism or dentistry.

[Mason Boyne]

Anyone with any sense/length of service took VR from there two or three years ago. Some are back as contractors clawing their losses back from their employee share scheme.

Seems funny though that their strategic review says they need rid of 15000 bodies but they're spunking 10 Mil a month on Accidenture and a couple of other consultancy firms to produce power point packs about how bad the integration programme is and at least two agencies i know of are trying to find people constantly for contract roles (today included).

Permie confusion = contractor happiness.

I believe TATA has a few Bobs embedded in Wythenshawe.

[TestMangler]

I believe TATA has a few Bobs embedded in Wythenshawe.

Lloyds had Bobs embedded EVERYWHERE. HBoS had gone that way in the last 5 years or so.

It'll only get more Bobtastic as they move more ops/dev/support/test/coffee machines to the third world (either Bangalore or Wythenshawe).

[Sysman]

I never figured out what SAS was about anyway. I suspect it was just something somebody made up to make money out of, like exorcism or dentistry.

I did a SAS course once.

Can't remember much about it to be honest.

I do remember getting the lecturer to show me how drilling down through data worked and it crashed the system.

[Spacecadet]

Andy McNab has written a few good SAS books

[TimberWolf]

Zoe was looking like a contender. Tom's a sitting duck and Natasha's days are numbered. Jim may be too much of a bulltulipter even for Surrallen. Susan lacks bulltulipting ability but could be a dark horse. Helen's looking strong based on re$ult$.