The key driver of the rising inflation causing economic mayhem across the developed world remains historically elevated oil and gas prices that have been in play since the prospect of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine first came into view, which was in September last year, when the oil price was around US$65 per barrel (pb) of Brent. This rise, when combined with the huge rise in global liquidity caused by the various long-running quantitative easing programs that followed the Great Financial Crisis, have led Western government to embark on a series of dramatic increases in interest rates aimed at capping inflation but ... (full story)