DINNER PARTY INTEL...
The topics you have to be able to discuss this week
1. Classic cars stall
Owners of vintage cars are finding that demand for the niche asset class is slipping. At an auction held at the Goodwood Festival of Speed in the UK in June, the top sale failed to crack £1m, a barrier easily crossed in previous years, according to Bloomberg.
The Hagerty collector car indices show sale prices more than doubled in value over the past decade. But prices peaked in 2016 and have since stalled — leading some to suspect the beginning of a slump.
2. High-risk health strategy
Efforts to repeal “Obamacare” could still go ahead — even without its replacement in place — if US President Donald Trump has his way. A Republican plan to replace the Patient Protection & Affordable Care Act with its own healthcare bill has collapsed. Two more Republican senators this week opposed their party’s proposed alternative, making it impossible for the bill to pass in its current form.
Even so, Trump has shown support for repealing Obamacare now, while allowing for a two-year delay to buy time for Republicans to come up with a replacement.
3. Pooh-poohing Pooh
An image of Chinese President Xi Jinping walking beside former US President Barack Obama was first circulated on Chinese social media, along with a picture of Winnie the Pooh and his slender friend Tigger, as far back as 2013. The Guardian says China’s ruling party is highly sensitive to comical depictions of its leader, and this week it cracked down on images of the honey-loving bear. Chinese censors did not explain the clampdown, but comments referencing “Little Bear Winnie” — Pooh’s Chinese name — turned up error messages saying the user could not proceed because “this content is illegal”.