Our facilitator, Alan Meredith, called upon several members for comments and contributions, including:

 

- Basil Dias, who enlightened us as to the friendly and safe nature of the Caribbean islands, many of which he lived on over the years.

- Suresh advised as to the political realities of India, being that the party in power has no meaningful opposition.

- Gerd spoke on the political situation in Germany, a representative democracy where the popular vote determines the winning parties, but where there are many parties, making it difficult for any one party to gain a majority. For the last 20 years, Germany has been governed by a coalition formed by the two largest parties, and as a result, nothing much is accomplished. In the former East Germany, the largest party is basically a neo-Nazi party that advocates the expulsion of foreigners. Sound familiar?

- Alan opened a discussion on electric vehicles and the consensus was that most present did not own, and were not planning to buy, electric vehicles. The problems with these vehicles are many, including the lack of sufficient charging stations.

- Gordon Brown provided his Football (Soccer) predictions. For the Premier League, Arsenal to win, then Liverpool and Man City. Chelsea will be in 6^th position. For the Euros in Germany, Bayern Munich will win, with Alphonso Davis scoring the winning goal. Manchester City will win the FA Cup. For the MLS, Toronto FC will make the play-offs, after having been at the bottom of the league last season. In the Cricket world, Surrey will win the County Championship.

The T20 World Cup is in June co-hosted by the West Indies and (for the first time) the USA. England are the defending champions and will win again. In Rugby, England has made a good start and will win the Six Nations. (Hope you all understand these predictions. Your Scribe predicts that the Leafs will not win the Stanley Cup, the Blue Jays will not win the World Series, and the Raptors will not win the NBA Championship. LOL!)

- Avrum then made predictions for the financial world, including:

- The US economy will continue to grow, whereas the Canadian economy has a higher risk of recession. The price of oil is going up, and since a third of the Canadian capital markets is based on oil, this may help with our capital markets.

- Europe’s markets have been down for years, so it would be a good bet if you want to buy low and sell high.

- In Canada, the current inverted yield situation, meaning the longer you lock in your investments, the lower the interest rate, is a recessionary indicator.

- Avrum predicts that Canadian interest rates will not decrease until after the 2^nd quarter of this year, and the decrease will probably only be 1/4 or 1/2 per cent.

- In summation, Equities are a good investment for growth.

 

Announcements:

 

- Gordon announced that Pub Night will replace our Rotary Luncheon Meeting next week. An invitation will be sent out shortly. Please respond to it!

 

 

Sgt-at-Arms, Mike Mushet, collected mostly happy bucks, including:

- Mike for no reason

- Avrum, because it’s good to be back from vacation

- Suresh, for his 48^th anniversary and a bill of good health from his cardiologist

- Dave for a review of his book stating that it is "the best book on this type of business ever published!"

- Peter for a presentation that he attended at Swan Lake on Sir Winston Churchill

- John, our visitor, because it was good to be with us

- Frank was happy that we had so many guests

- Arthur was happy that he will be taking his daughter out for her birthday at a Japanese restaurant

 

President Avrum then terminated the meeting.

 

Scribe: Barry Smith