Eventually, rain
MY advice to its central banker is to give up his Harold Wilson imitation and take his cue from Eliot (`Calamity) Janeway. The sage was once asked to prognosticate at a grand conference on climate change and the effect of drought on the American agricul- tural economy. He came armed, so he said, with information from the highest sources: `Eventually, it will rain.' Eventually, the euro will bounce. Markets do not move in one direction for ever. Unfortunately, the euro's political masters do not understand markets and do not approve of them. To create it, they did away with Europe's effi- cient and flexible currency markets, and now they are startled to find that the mar- kets have had the last laugh on them. My own researches have led me to Italy, where I have been correlating the weakness of the euro with the strength of the negroni. I can report that a well-made negroni costs 5.16 euros, or 10,000 lire, which means that you can drink three of them and be left with change out of a tenner. We should welcome this, though John Monks of the Trades Union Congress does not. He wants the Chancellor to bomb the pound by investing in euros, but all experience shows that the problems of a strong currency are nothing to the problems of a weak one. If in doubt, ask Wim Duisenberg.
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