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The UK's PM Andy Burnham toys with undoing BREXIT

We don't talk a lot about the UK in this investor letter - mainly because there hasn't been much to get excited about for quite some time, but it is worth remembering that the UK is still the world's 5th largest economy, so indulge us for a moment.   The UK's prime minister, Mr Burnham has put his head above the parapet and said what so many in his party have been desperate to hear (including the notoriously left-wing FT) - that it's time to consider going "all the way [in]" again on the EU.

Burnham is using the following chart to back up his claim that most people in the UK regret BREXIT.

At the time of the BREXIT vote in 2016, we were close to a senior member of the BREXIT team and he confided that not even they really wanted to leave the EU, they just wanted a better deal for the UK, which Merkel at the time refused.  The BREXIT team were also not expecting to win.  And neither were the two dominant parties at the time - the Conservatives and Labour - who also did not want to leave either.  So when the UK public voted to leave, it was a disaster for the ruling political elite who lost their chance of (1) tax free living in Brussels, (2) a future gold-plated pension working in an institution answerable to nobody, and most importantly of all, (3) someone else to blame for the country's economic woes.  And they have never really got over it since… and it is probably why the UK has had 7 prime ministers since 2016.

So has the UK economy suffered?  According to the FT - "of course it has!"…. only the FT could conclude from this chart below that "UK goods exports have been hit by BREXIT" and fail to mention that the services sector (which represents 72% of the UK economy) has gone great guns.  The banking, investment and insurance sectors never really moved to Paris or Frankfurt.  A few jobs moved, but not many - and life kind of carried on as normal.   In fact, more high value jobs are likely to leave London because of the end of the non-dom tax regime, than because of BREXIT.

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