THE last six months of 2016 were filled with a lot of uncertainty, and in some cases panic and even despair, brought on partly by the Brexit decision and the result of the US election.
The problem is that no one yet knows, with any certainty, how either of those major events will affect our economy. The doom merchants would have you believe that the effect of these two events will be to depress the economy, increase unemployment and encourage inflation through a weakening pound.
My response to this? We need to be adopting a positive business attitude and encouraging industry to take advantage of the newly developing situation. An obvious example of this is the export potential offered by the weakening pound. OK, so it makes imports more expensive! The answer – increase sourcing within the UK. This has the dual benefit of increasing employment and revenue within the UK whilst reducing the trade deficit. Marginal in the short term but with great long term benefits. Oh for politicians who can think long term!
And what about the EU and Brexit – you might ask. Well, hopefully, this decision will persuade many more UK firms to do what we should have been doing much better over the last 70 years; that is to concentrate more on exporting our goods and services around the world. Secondly, this much-feared Brexit may not be anywhere near as painful and disastrous as feared. For example, it is interesting to note that we are seeing a great deal of dissent around Europe at the moment with increasing mutterings about the break up of the EU. Whilst this may be pie in the sky it does indicate that there are many in Europe who think that us Brits may have made the right decision. We are not alone!
Only time will tell who is right. One thing is for sure, however. At BFS we have not seen a drop off in enquiries for growth finance. Just the opposite, in fact, both start-up and established businesses are looking to fund growth and development, and we are happy to be able to help them!
If you would like help then call us on 01327 349779 or email
We look forward to hearing from you