[It is] voyeurism embellished with footnotes.

I'm not sure they've got the drive or technical skill to make the best use of the oil money. It's always a difficult initiative in easy times to prepare for difficult times ahead.

The 'rise' of China has suddenly become the all-absorbing topic for those professionally concerned with the future of the planet,

If only one person were perfectly informed there could never be a general crisis. But the only perfectly informed person is God, and he does not play the stock market.

As long as the oil market remains buoyant, as it does for other commodities, then the Russian economy will prosper. The consumption boom is growing on the back of the wealth being produced by commodity growth.

Experience has taught us that material wants know no natural bounds, that they will expand without end unless we consciously restrain them. Capitalism rests precisely on this endless expansion of wants. That is why, for all its success, it remains so unloved. It has given us wealth beyond measure, but has taken away the chief benefit of wealth: the consciousness of having enough.