Inflation, interest rates, and the forces that move markets.
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The Consumer Price Index is how a country actually measures inflation. Learn what the 'basket of goods' is, how a national statistics agency builds the number, the difference between headline and core inflation, why central banks target 2%, and why a CPI release can move markets in seconds.
Gross Domestic Product is the single number that sums up the size of an economy. Learn the three ways it's measured, the crucial difference between real and nominal GDP, what growth and contraction mean, how it defines a recession, why investors track it — and the important things it leaves out.
Interest rates are the price of money, and the single most powerful lever in the economy. Learn what they are, how central banks set them, how a change ripples out to your mortgage, your savings and the stock market, and why almost every asset is repriced when rates move.
A bond is a tradable loan — and the second great asset class alongside shares. Learn the anatomy of a bond, the all-important inverse relationship between bond prices and interest rates, gilts vs corporates, credit and duration risk, and why bonds act as ballast in a portfolio.
Gilts are bonds issued by the UK government — the foundation of British finance and the benchmark against which almost every other UK investment is priced. Learn the three types, how gilt yields work, why the 10-year gilt matters, the unusual tax treatment that makes gilts distinctive, and what the 2022 gilt crisis taught everyone.
The Producer Price Index measures inflation at the factory gate, before it reaches the shops — which makes it an early warning for the CPI you feel as a consumer. Learn input vs output PPI, the inflation pipeline, why PPI leads CPI, and how investors read it.
When cutting interest rates isn't enough, central banks reach for their balance sheet. Quantitative easing (QE) creates money to buy bonds — pushing long-term rates down and lifting asset prices; quantitative tightening (QT) reverses it. Learn how both work, why the zero lower bound made QE necessary, what tapering means, and how the Fed's balance sheet went from under $1tn to ~$9tn and back.
A recession is a broad, sustained fall in economic activity — and one of the defining events for any investor. Learn how recessions are defined and caused, the business cycle they belong to, the warning signs that lead them, what they do to markets, and why the stock market usually turns before the economy does.