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Savers and merchants worldwide are being forced to price scarce resources in ever-depreciating money…<\/em><\/p>\n \n BLAME <\/strong>speculators, poor weather, global demand, or the Federal Reserve as you choose. Either way, sugar<\/a>‘s up, wheat<\/a>‘s up, and cotton’s new record highs are starting to hurt Chinese textile makers.<\/p>\n \n Hence this bale in the wind. Clothing and footwear prices to UK consumers rose year-on-year in September for the first time since March 1992<\/a>, hitting a two-year high in absolute terms.<\/p>\n \nYet only now do central bankers fear deflation ahead. C’mon…where do they find these people?<\/p>\n \n“The longevity of what appears to be a speculative bubble in cotton prices,” will determine 2011 profits at UK clothes retailer Next<\/a>, it warned this week, adding that rising costs will force it to raise shop prices.<\/p>\n \nOver in China \u2013 which uses some 40% of the world’s raw cotton output…and accounts for one-third<\/a> of global textile exports \u2013 textile manufacturers face a “shortage of raw material<\/a>“, said industry group the China Federation of Logistics and Purchasing meantime, with last month’s record-high prices “endangering” their survival.<\/p>\n \nFor our money here at BullionVault<\/a>, we’ll blame loose monetary policy…and not just from force of habit, either. The Pound Sterling, like the US Dollar, looks further than ever from paying a positive real rate of interest \u2013 leaving both savers and merchants to price scarce resources in ever-depreciating, ever-more generously supplied currencies.<\/p>\n \nShort of an about-turn in monetary policy, the near-halving of UK clothing and footwear prices since 1989 appears finished.<\/p>\n \nShop \u2013 and invest \u2013 accordingly.<\/p>\n \nAdrian Ash<\/p>\n \nBullionVault<\/a><\/p>\n \nGold price chart, no delay<\/a> |\u00a0\u00a0 Buy gold online at live prices<\/a><\/p>\n \nFormerly City correspondent for The Daily Reckoning in London and head of editorial at the UK’s leading financial advisory for private investors, Adrian Ash<\/strong> is the editor of Gold News<\/a> and head of research at BullionVault<\/a> \u2013 winner of the Queen’s Award for Enterprise Innovation, 2009 and now backed by the mining-sector’s World Gold Council<\/a> research body \u2013 where you can buy gold today<\/a> vaulted in Zurich on $3 spreads and 0.8% dealing fees.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.goldgenie.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/129.jpg\" "\\"1\\"")
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