8 ms·

Bank Underground, the blog written by Bank of England staff

166 points by Erikun 10y ago

tombrossman 10y ago
Bank of England blog: HTTPS only Bank of England primary website: HTTP only They get bonus points for their Let's Encrypt cert and a solid 'A' on SSL Labs (some amusing alt names on the cert though - not their fault and no big deal). Maybe someone at the bank will realize soon that HTTPS is for more than protecting log-ins, it guarantees the integrity of the page and makes sure the browser displays only and exactly what was sent, with no tampering in transit.
- corin_ 10y ago
  They just chose to have a hosted blog from Wordpress with a custom domain, Wordpress chose to use a Let's Encrypt certificate and to lump a bunch of different customers' custom domains into one certificate request hence the alt names.
  - oarsinsync 10y ago
    Lots of sites using the same private key. Could this be potentially problematic?
    - corin_ 10y ago
      I wouldn't think so... Wordpress keeps the private key themselves the customers won't have access to it.
    - tombrossman 10y ago
      Not really, the host is already trusted (as explained in the parent comment). The domain owner is free to obtain a different certificate with a new private key that only they know if they wish. When you choose to use shared hosting you are already delegating plenty of trust so it's reasonable to use the host's private key.
- beejiu 10y ago
  This was also the case with GCHQ's website until recently.
- biggio 10y ago
  Browser not supported :D https://www.boe-careers.co.uk/OA_HTML/RF.jsp?function_id=14296&resp_id=23350&resp_appl_id=800&security_group_id=0&lang_code=US&params=aQhzj2W4CCLRwPqS9WKsL3g9L4-t-7jg8PesrvKQBCBiD5wQ4V4p54l.zGnMeLWR&oas=lf6CiwzDoFJim3TytDxGow. https://www.boe-careers.co.uk/OA_HTML/RF.jsp?function_id=142....
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
coderdude 10y ago
This looks promising and different. I like that they say up front that some staff opinions will align with the views of the organization and some will not. I'm sure someone will come up with something shallow to complain about but this is actually cool.
- branchless 10y ago
  BoE are very old establishment. I think taking text on a BoE blog that it will be free speech is not realistic. Like the BBC they will be with you right until it matters. Then you are on one side of the fence and the establishment are on the other with the BBC/BoE next to them, grinning.
kinai 10y ago
"Our goal is to bring more of our thinking into the public domain..." Like any other bank: Rob the small people, give to the rich, make the government your bitch
- spicerguy 10y ago
  I would suggest you find out a little bit more about the BoE. It's not an investment or retail bank, it's a central bank which is more about influencing economic policy and other banking policy than pushing money around. Interestingly the UK government decoupled the bank from direct control in 1998, which greatly reduced the risk of wild interest rate fluctuations driven by political motivations, which had caused a lot of pain in the previous decades.
  - oarsinsync 10y ago
    Note that it's a group of private bankers dictating monetary policy for the country.
    - spicerguy 10y ago
      The bank itself is owned by the government but has independence from it in certain matters of policy. There are certainly many employees who come from private banking backgrounds but the bank is not a private bank.
    - pjc50 10y ago
      They're public bankers. It's an arms-length institution wholly owned by the UK government, which has mandated them to set monetary policy to meet statistical targets as a means of de-politicising monetary policy. It works quite well, certainly better than when it was directly run and the UK had a lot of inflationary instability.
      - TheOtherHobbes 10y ago
        The BoE provides political air cover for political decisions. In no real sense is it politically independent. It can be relied on to do absolutely nothing to promote economic policies that could benefit the majority of the population at the expense of bankers, land owners, rentiers, and speculators.
spicerguy 10y ago
completely irrelevant point of clarification: bank underground refers to the London Underground (metro station) stop immediately in front of the bank, rather than some sort of anarchist agenda (but given UK civil servants general ambivalence towards authority there may be a slightly sly nod to the alternative reading of this).
- jessriedel 10y ago
  Couldnt it be a double entendre? "Weather undrground" isnt anarchist, but it is a tongue in cheek way to express that its not mainstream.
  - colah3 10y ago
    Although, there was at one point an anarchist organization called the weather underground: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weather_Underground https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weather_Underground I understand they had a "brick reallocation committee" that reallocated bricks through windows. As objectionable as such behavior might be, I find the understated names pretty amusing.
user_rob 10y ago
This is a really good resource for anyone interested in economics at any level, but personally I would like them to provide a children's version (Which would suit my level of interest better).
- timthorn 10y ago
  Not saying that this is what you're arguing, but - I wish it wasn't assumed that children are only able to understand simple concepts. Younger kids might find it hard to get through dense prose, buy that doesn't mean that the ideas therein couldn't be understood with appropriate presentation. If you've a child with a deep interest in an area, you get to the point where you've devoured the children's literature on the subject and are left grasping for new material that will satisfy their thirst for new knowledge in a form they can read themselves.
  - CaptSpify 10y ago
    Maybe "beginner's version" would be a better way to phrase it?
branchless 10y ago
This blog is like a guerrilla offshoot from the BoE from staff who are trying to tell us we are being robbed blind by the banks. Best one is this: https://bankunderground.co.uk/2015/06/30/banks-are-not-intermediaries-of-loanable-funds-and-why-this-matters/ https://bankunderground.co.uk/2015/06/30/banks-are-not-inter... Banks do not intermediate funds when lending they create new money. This has interest due on it. Create more to cover the interest or die. Please HN have a read as I see so many disheartening comments on HN about finance. It's depressing.
- alanwatts 10y ago
  >Banks do not intermediate funds when lending they create new money. This has interest due on it. Create more to cover the interest or die. Professor Franz Hormann of the Vienna University of Economics further elaborates on this catch-22 in his banned TED talk: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FYWVbdSX7B4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FYWVbdSX7B4
  - digi_owl 10y ago
    Banned?!
  - oneloop 10y ago
    [citation needed]
    - alanwatts 10y ago
      I don't know what "banned" means in this case, it's just from the title. His point stands however: Money Supply + Interest > Money Supply => perpetual debt servitude
- notahacker 10y ago
  This is not exactly secret knowledge you have to be a guerilla to let out. I mean, the bank itself does that in formal bulletins released on its website http://www.bankofengland.co.uk/publications/Documents/quarterlybulletin/2014/qb14q1prereleasemoneycreation.pdf http://www.bankofengland.co.uk/publications/Documents/quarte... and even produces video for people that don't like reading economic papers https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CvRAqR2pAgw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CvRAqR2pAgw
chollida1 10y ago
This is a great site for anyone who is interested in macro economics and global credit issues. I've followed it for the past year and here is a list of "curated" articles from the blog that I found interesting enough to bookmark and make notes on: https://bankunderground.co.uk/2016/05/03/the-growth-of-peer-to-peer-lending-platforms-and-prospects-for-banks-disintermediation-hype-or-real-threat/ https://bankunderground.co.uk/2016/05/03/the-growth-of-peer-... https://bankunderground.co.uk/2016/03/22/1602/ https://bankunderground.co.uk/2016/03/22/1602/ https://bankunderground.co.uk/2016/03/18/ https://bankunderground.co.uk/2016/03/18/ https://bankunderground.co.uk/2015/10/30/rational-and-behavioural-drivers-of-financial-markets-the-case-of-search-for-yield/ https://bankunderground.co.uk/2015/10/30/rational-and-behavi... https://bankunderground.co.uk/2015/10/20/does-oil-drive-financial-market-inflation-expectations/ https://bankunderground.co.uk/2015/10/20/does-oil-drive-fina... https://bankunderground.co.uk/2015/10/14/is-starting-a-new-market-like-opening-a-nightclub/ https://bankunderground.co.uk/2015/10/14/is-starting-a-new-m... https://bankunderground.co.uk/2015/11/19/regulatory-arbitrage-in-action-evidence-from-cross-border-lending-and-macroprudential-policy/ https://bankunderground.co.uk/2015/11/19/regulatory-arbitrag... https://bankunderground.co.uk/2016/01/15/testing-the-test-how-reliable-are-risk-model-backtesting-results/ https://bankunderground.co.uk/2016/01/15/testing-the-test-ho... https://bankunderground.co.uk/2016/02/29/stress-tests-the-small-print-matters/ https://bankunderground.co.uk/2016/02/29/stress-tests-the-sm... https://bankunderground.co.uk/2016/03/31/modelling-banking-sector-shocks-and-unconventional-policy-new-wine-in-old-bottles/ https://bankunderground.co.uk/2016/03/31/modelling-banking-s... The bank of England has been very lucky with the people it has had lead it in the past 20 years. It had Mervyn King lead it up until recently and since then Mark Carney, they stole him from the same position in Canada:(, has lead them. England's been very lucky to have these two people in charge of its fiscal path. Canada has certainly missed Mark Carney's leadership. http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2016-05-05/the-book-that-will-save-banking-from-itself http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2016-05-05/the-book-th...
jsprogrammer 10y ago
The top post [0] leads with a factually incorrect assertion: >Peer-to-peer lending platforms (P2P platforms) emerged after the financial crisis by catering for pent-up demand for unsecured borrowing from individuals and small businesses. Prosper was started in 2005 and the article's primary example, Zopa, started in 2004. [0] https://bankunderground.co.uk/2016/05/03/the-growth-of-peer-to-peer-lending-platforms-and-prospects-for-banks-disintermediation-hype-or-real-threat/#more-1705 https://bankunderground.co.uk/2016/05/03/the-growth-of-peer-...
- jonwachob91 10y ago
  Maybe they are referring to the Tech bubble of the early 2000's? Kinda of a stretch but still possible...
  - jsprogrammer 10y ago
    Vague terminology is vague. The article was written in the last month (presumably); referring to 2000 as "the financial crisis" would be supremely dishonest given what we have experienced since then. I get that banks provoke regular crises, so there are many that could be referred to, but I can't imagine this article was referring to the 2000 tech bubble.
Paul_S 10y ago
This is fluff. Is there a banking equivalent of (no longer available) NightJack? (If you don't know because maybe you don't live in the UK, NighJack was a blog written by a cop, off the record)
- dmix 10y ago
  I found the few article's I read on the blog had pretty high quality content. Did you read any of them?

166 points by Erikun 10y ago

Bank of England blog: HTTPS only Bank of England primary website: HTTP only They get bonus points for their Let's Encrypt cert and a solid 'A' on SSL Labs (some amusing alt names on the cert though - not their fault and no big deal). Maybe someone at the bank will realize soon that HTTPS is for more than protecting log-ins, it guarantees the integrity of the page and makes sure the browser displays only and exactly what was sent, with no tampering in transit.

corin_ 10y ago
They just chose to have a hosted blog from Wordpress with a custom domain, Wordpress chose to use a Let's Encrypt certificate and to lump a bunch of different customers' custom domains into one certificate request hence the alt names.
- oarsinsync 10y ago
  Lots of sites using the same private key. Could this be potentially problematic?
  - corin_ 10y ago
    I wouldn't think so... Wordpress keeps the private key themselves the customers won't have access to it.
  - tombrossman 10y ago
    Not really, the host is already trusted (as explained in the parent comment). The domain owner is free to obtain a different certificate with a new private key that only they know if they wish. When you choose to use shared hosting you are already delegating plenty of trust so it's reasonable to use the host's private key.
beejiu 10y ago
This was also the case with GCHQ's website until recently.
biggio 10y ago
Browser not supported :D https://www.boe-careers.co.uk/OA_HTML/RF.jsp?function_id=14296&resp_id=23350&resp_appl_id=800&security_group_id=0&lang_code=US&params=aQhzj2W4CCLRwPqS9WKsL3g9L4-t-7jg8PesrvKQBCBiD5wQ4V4p54l.zGnMeLWR&oas=lf6CiwzDoFJim3TytDxGow. https://www.boe-careers.co.uk/OA_HTML/RF.jsp?function_id=142....
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]

coderdude 10y ago

This looks promising and different. I like that they say up front that some staff opinions will align with the views of the organization and some will not. I'm sure someone will come up with something shallow to complain about but this is actually cool.

branchless 10y ago
BoE are very old establishment. I think taking text on a BoE blog that it will be free speech is not realistic. Like the BBC they will be with you right until it matters. Then you are on one side of the fence and the establishment are on the other with the BBC/BoE next to them, grinning.

kinai 10y ago

"Our goal is to bring more of our thinking into the public domain..." Like any other bank: Rob the small people, give to the rich, make the government your bitch

spicerguy 10y ago
I would suggest you find out a little bit more about the BoE. It's not an investment or retail bank, it's a central bank which is more about influencing economic policy and other banking policy than pushing money around. Interestingly the UK government decoupled the bank from direct control in 1998, which greatly reduced the risk of wild interest rate fluctuations driven by political motivations, which had caused a lot of pain in the previous decades.
- oarsinsync 10y ago
  Note that it's a group of private bankers dictating monetary policy for the country.
  - spicerguy 10y ago
    The bank itself is owned by the government but has independence from it in certain matters of policy. There are certainly many employees who come from private banking backgrounds but the bank is not a private bank.
  - pjc50 10y ago
    They're public bankers. It's an arms-length institution wholly owned by the UK government, which has mandated them to set monetary policy to meet statistical targets as a means of de-politicising monetary policy. It works quite well, certainly better than when it was directly run and the UK had a lot of inflationary instability.
    - TheOtherHobbes 10y ago
      The BoE provides political air cover for political decisions. In no real sense is it politically independent. It can be relied on to do absolutely nothing to promote economic policies that could benefit the majority of the population at the expense of bankers, land owners, rentiers, and speculators.

spicerguy 10y ago

completely irrelevant point of clarification: bank underground refers to the London Underground (metro station) stop immediately in front of the bank, rather than some sort of anarchist agenda (but given UK civil servants general ambivalence towards authority there may be a slightly sly nod to the alternative reading of this).

jessriedel 10y ago
Couldnt it be a double entendre? "Weather undrground" isnt anarchist, but it is a tongue in cheek way to express that its not mainstream.
- colah3 10y ago
  Although, there was at one point an anarchist organization called the weather underground: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weather_Underground https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weather_Underground I understand they had a "brick reallocation committee" that reallocated bricks through windows. As objectionable as such behavior might be, I find the understated names pretty amusing.

user_rob 10y ago

This is a really good resource for anyone interested in economics at any level, but personally I would like them to provide a children's version (Which would suit my level of interest better).

timthorn 10y ago
Not saying that this is what you're arguing, but - I wish it wasn't assumed that children are only able to understand simple concepts. Younger kids might find it hard to get through dense prose, buy that doesn't mean that the ideas therein couldn't be understood with appropriate presentation. If you've a child with a deep interest in an area, you get to the point where you've devoured the children's literature on the subject and are left grasping for new material that will satisfy their thirst for new knowledge in a form they can read themselves.
- CaptSpify 10y ago
  Maybe "beginner's version" would be a better way to phrase it?

branchless 10y ago

This blog is like a guerrilla offshoot from the BoE from staff who are trying to tell us we are being robbed blind by the banks. Best one is this: https://bankunderground.co.uk/2015/06/30/banks-are-not-intermediaries-of-loanable-funds-and-why-this-matters/ https://bankunderground.co.uk/2015/06/30/banks-are-not-inter... Banks do not intermediate funds when lending they create new money. This has interest due on it. Create more to cover the interest or die. Please HN have a read as I see so many disheartening comments on HN about finance. It's depressing.

alanwatts 10y ago
>Banks do not intermediate funds when lending they create new money. This has interest due on it. Create more to cover the interest or die. Professor Franz Hormann of the Vienna University of Economics further elaborates on this catch-22 in his banned TED talk: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FYWVbdSX7B4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FYWVbdSX7B4
- digi_owl 10y ago
  Banned?!
- oneloop 10y ago
  [citation needed]
  - alanwatts 10y ago
    I don't know what "banned" means in this case, it's just from the title. His point stands however: Money Supply + Interest > Money Supply => perpetual debt servitude
notahacker 10y ago
This is not exactly secret knowledge you have to be a guerilla to let out. I mean, the bank itself does that in formal bulletins released on its website http://www.bankofengland.co.uk/publications/Documents/quarterlybulletin/2014/qb14q1prereleasemoneycreation.pdf http://www.bankofengland.co.uk/publications/Documents/quarte... and even produces video for people that don't like reading economic papers https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CvRAqR2pAgw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CvRAqR2pAgw

chollida1 10y ago

This is a great site for anyone who is interested in macro economics and global credit issues. I've followed it for the past year and here is a list of "curated" articles from the blog that I found interesting enough to bookmark and make notes on: https://bankunderground.co.uk/2016/05/03/the-growth-of-peer-to-peer-lending-platforms-and-prospects-for-banks-disintermediation-hype-or-real-threat/ https://bankunderground.co.uk/2016/05/03/the-growth-of-peer-... https://bankunderground.co.uk/2016/03/22/1602/ https://bankunderground.co.uk/2016/03/22/1602/ https://bankunderground.co.uk/2016/03/18/ https://bankunderground.co.uk/2016/03/18/ https://bankunderground.co.uk/2015/10/30/rational-and-behavioural-drivers-of-financial-markets-the-case-of-search-for-yield/ https://bankunderground.co.uk/2015/10/30/rational-and-behavi... https://bankunderground.co.uk/2015/10/20/does-oil-drive-financial-market-inflation-expectations/ https://bankunderground.co.uk/2015/10/20/does-oil-drive-fina... https://bankunderground.co.uk/2015/10/14/is-starting-a-new-market-like-opening-a-nightclub/ https://bankunderground.co.uk/2015/10/14/is-starting-a-new-m... https://bankunderground.co.uk/2015/11/19/regulatory-arbitrage-in-action-evidence-from-cross-border-lending-and-macroprudential-policy/ https://bankunderground.co.uk/2015/11/19/regulatory-arbitrag... https://bankunderground.co.uk/2016/01/15/testing-the-test-how-reliable-are-risk-model-backtesting-results/ https://bankunderground.co.uk/2016/01/15/testing-the-test-ho... https://bankunderground.co.uk/2016/02/29/stress-tests-the-small-print-matters/ https://bankunderground.co.uk/2016/02/29/stress-tests-the-sm... https://bankunderground.co.uk/2016/03/31/modelling-banking-sector-shocks-and-unconventional-policy-new-wine-in-old-bottles/ https://bankunderground.co.uk/2016/03/31/modelling-banking-s... The bank of England has been very lucky with the people it has had lead it in the past 20 years. It had Mervyn King lead it up until recently and since then Mark Carney, they stole him from the same position in Canada:(, has lead them. England's been very lucky to have these two people in charge of its fiscal path. Canada has certainly missed Mark Carney's leadership. http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2016-05-05/the-book-that-will-save-banking-from-itself http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2016-05-05/the-book-th...

jsprogrammer 10y ago

The top post [0] leads with a factually incorrect assertion: >Peer-to-peer lending platforms (P2P platforms) emerged after the financial crisis by catering for pent-up demand for unsecured borrowing from individuals and small businesses. Prosper was started in 2005 and the article's primary example, Zopa, started in 2004. [0] https://bankunderground.co.uk/2016/05/03/the-growth-of-peer-to-peer-lending-platforms-and-prospects-for-banks-disintermediation-hype-or-real-threat/#more-1705 https://bankunderground.co.uk/2016/05/03/the-growth-of-peer-...

jonwachob91 10y ago
Maybe they are referring to the Tech bubble of the early 2000's? Kinda of a stretch but still possible...
- jsprogrammer 10y ago
  Vague terminology is vague. The article was written in the last month (presumably); referring to 2000 as "the financial crisis" would be supremely dishonest given what we have experienced since then. I get that banks provoke regular crises, so there are many that could be referred to, but I can't imagine this article was referring to the 2000 tech bubble.

Paul_S 10y ago

This is fluff. Is there a banking equivalent of (no longer available) NightJack? (If you don't know because maybe you don't live in the UK, NighJack was a blog written by a cop, off the record)

dmix 10y ago
I found the few article's I read on the blog had pretty high quality content. Did you read any of them?