NationStates Jolt Archive

For any watching the financial meltdown of the lil old UK (or who aren't but want to have opinions anyway), what do you think of Robert Peston.

For those not cursed to have him on their newscreens, he's the BBC's top economy bod. What's more important is that he's managed to acquire more or less a hotline into Number 10 Downing Street. Richard Branson has claimed that when trying to run it by Northern Rock he was told it would have to be run by Peston to see how he (and the BBC) would react to it news wise (I don't feel like getting a link, so google or ignore this).

More recently, he apparently snagged some inside info (the ship of state is the only one that leaks from the top after all) about the possibility of the banks going cap in hand to the PM and asking for money (iirc) then announced this as fact on the BBC. Which led to the share prices taking a nosedive off the cliff-face of their already sinking values. Hardly surprisingly, when it became apparent that Mr Peston had caused this through error, he annoyed (or futher annoyed) rather a large number of people in the financial world, who now want him to go forth and multiply.

For background there've been implications of dodgy dealings in the past with Mr Peston, including some large scale share movements just before he made an exclusive announcement about a major bank takeover/merger.

So, how close should gov and media be, and how much responsibility should the press (in this case Peston and the BBC) take for scaremongering in times like these when confidence is everything.

Well, if the response to short selling is any indication, all reporting on matters of economic or financial importance should be banned until further notice.

I'm not sure that they shouldn't have a right to, but they shouldn't as a matter of principle, report leaked stories about government action in the economy that could have a major effect, that have not been confirmed. Things like this really fuck up the economy.

Well, if the response to short selling is any indication, all reporting on matters of economic or financial importance should be banned until further notice.

I'm not sure banning it would be a good idea, since that would likely create even more hysteria.

Huh. Just when I'd come around to the idea that Reg. FD (http://www.sec.gov/answers/regfd.htm) was a bad job, this makes it sound like the rule doesn't go far enough -- it should refer to governments as well (oh, and they should have it in the UK.)

in america we have fox and cnn. thank god we've also got amy goodman's democracy now.

this little link might be of some slight interest to the topic at hand:

http://www.democracynow.org/2008/10/6/naomi_klein

this little link might be of some slight interest to the topic at hand:

http://www.democracynow.org/2008/10/6/naomi_klein
It's not. It's also known as an argument of guilt by association.

As much as I think the media needs to be more responsible, not necessarily given the above example but across the board, I can simply see no way to do this where the negatives don't outweigh the benefits.