Marx’s ideas also began as an idealistic blueprint for a fairer world. The tragedy was that they underestimated incentives, entrepreneurship and human nature, while overestimating the willingness of people and nations to subordinate their own interests to a grand collective vision. The result was coercion, authoritarianism and immense human suffering. Piketty’s Global Justice Report rests on a similar flaw. It assumes nations will voluntarily surrender sovereignty, taxpayers will accept ever-greater redistribution, and entrepreneurs will continue taking risks despite modest capped rewards. Yet a system requiring worldwide political conformity can only be achieved through coercion—and coercion has a poor historical record.

If you need someone to lend you an additional £130bn every year to cover overspending their opinion is going to count whether anyone voted for them or not.

He’s not alone in thinking landlords are a rentier class exploiting tenants, producing nothing, and deserving to be taxed into extinction — if not outright nationalised. No wonder Britain continues its slow and tortured decline.

I’ve modelled 3 possible UK CGT systems over 20 years assuming: • £100k invested • 7% annual returns • 3% annual inflation • invested in a collective fund (taxed once to CGT at the end) or a portfolio of individual shares sold every 5 years and taxed after each disposal • No ISAs/pensions used Current System (24% CGT, no indexation) • Fund: £318k final value | 5.96% pa • Shares: £291k final value | 5.48% pa 45% CGT Inflation Indexation • Fund: £294k final value | 5.55% pa • Shares: £280k final value | 5.28% pa 45% CGT, NO Indexation • Fund: £258k final value | 4.91% pa • Shares: £218k final value | 4.01% pa So based on these assumptions indexation largely offsets the impact of the higher headline rate of CGT. However, in the real world returns are volatile rather than a smooth 7% annually. That likely makes high-rate CGT systems more economically distortive than static models suggest, because tax gets paid after strong years while losses are only relieved later — permanently removing capital from long-term compounding.

These proposals will only change investor behaviour and therefore are unlikely to raise the hoped-for £12bn a year. Higher capital gains tax rates will encourage many investors to move away from owning shares directly and into collective funds. Inside a fund, managers can switch investments at the appropriate time without triggering tax for the end investor, whereas individuals managing their own portfolios would face repeated tax charges for reallocating capital. That may be good news for large fund management groups, but not for engaged private investors who back individual companies — especially smaller quoted businesses.

This really puts the sword to the Gary Stevenson narrative that the UK is some kind of hotbed of extreme inequality.

A lot of chatter this morning already on the latest Blue Owl news (below), centered as much on the size of investor redemption requests as on the imposition of additional withdrawal caps. #economy #privatecredit #markets

Positive update from Bioventix, confirming its position as a key player in the emerging Neurology & Alzheimer’s blood-testing market. “Amongst the RuO B-D pT217 assays being developed by the leading IVD companies (e.g. Roche, Siemens, Abbott, Beckman, Quidel-Ortho, Mindray etc.), three use at least one Bioventix SMA in their assay design.  For the newer high sensitivity research-orientated platform companies (e.g. Quanterix, Alamar, Spear, Bio-techne/Ella, Merck/SCM&Singulex, Stata etc.) three have also included at least one Bioventix SMA in their RuO pT217 assay design”.

I was very sad to hear that Roger Lawson has passed away. Roger was a tireless champion of the private investor and played a central role in the establishment of @ShareSoc. He was intelligent, determined and fearless. His fluid writing style made his blog, roliscon.blog, consistently engaging. Roger could be pugnacious and, at times, stubborn - qualities that sometimes made him challenging to deal with - but he also showed real integrity and grace in acknowledging mistakes, as he did following the Globo plc episode more than a decade ago. His death, coming so soon after the untimely losses of David Webb and Mark Bentley, is a significant blow to all of us who care about the rights of private investors. My condolences to his son Alex and the rest of his family.

Depressing. UK GDP per capita has been flat for two decades. Without growth, the welfare state is on borrowed time. We need to shrink the state and unleash enterprise.

US Supreme Court strikes down Trump’s Tariffs. “The president asserts the extraordinary power to unilaterally impose tariffs of unlimited amount, duration, and scope,” Roberts wrote for the court. “In light of the breadth, history, and constitutional context of that asserted authority, he must identify clear congressional authorization to exercise it.” The emergency authority Trump attempted to rely on, the court said, “falls short.” 6-3 majority.

Barclays Bank my best performing share in 2025 has just released its Annual Report which contains some very exciting targets including the prospect of a 5-6% dividend yield. It aims to :- 1) lift its RoTE from 11.3% to 14% by 2028 2) increase capital distribution (dividends and buy backs) from £3.7bn in 2025 to £15bn over the three years 2026 to 2028 3) buyback a further £1bn of equity. As it bought back £2.5bn in 2025 and given its commitment to increase capital distribution to an average of £5bn over the next 3 years the dividends will increase substantially from the £1.2bn paid out in 2025. Assuming £4.5bn of capital distributions in 2026 that means total dividends of £3.6bn, three times the value of the 2025 dividend. The forward dividend yield for 2026 could be in region of 5-6%. Tangible Net Asset Value per share increased 14.5% in 2025 to 409p. The company now trades on a modest premium to its TNAV of 20%.

I’m speaking tonight at 19:20 on Mello Monday. Mello Insights: Leon Boros' 2026 Investing Strategy & Stocks To Watch. Not too late to join. melloevents.com/mm090226

Congratulations. Glad to have been of some assistance. I hope you didn’t follow my Novo Nordisk suggestion! youtu.be/mufcv88NvI4