Fuelling the Fire: Middle East Tensions and Ireland's High Cost-Energy Crisis
8 October 2024 - 37 minsAs tensions rise between Israel and Iran, the global energy market is feeling the strain. Oil prices have jumped from $72 to $78 per barrel, and any further escalation could disrupt key producers like Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and the UAE, pushing prices even higher. With Israel attempting to provoke Iran into a wider conflict, the U.S. is caught in a delicate balancing act, trying to avoid being drawn in while managing domestic inflation and rising gas prices. For Ireland, already suffering from the highest energy costs in Europe, this adds a dangerous layer of pressure. With 80% of its energy imported and an overburdened grid, the country is highly vulnerable to global shocks. Despite Ireland’s...
Series Episodes
Mbappé vs Le Pen: The Battle for France
On this 14th of July, as Les Bleus face Spain in the semi-final, France is heading into a political crisis that could reshape Europe because where France goes, Europe usually follows. We dig into why Marine Le Pen is now the favourite for the presidency, why the French football team has become her loudest critic, and, with France on the brink, why a World Cup win might yet influence politics in a way that few sporting achievements have ever done before. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
42 mins
14 July Finished
England V Norway: A Tale of Two Oil Discoveries?
Norway turned North Sea oil into $2 trillion in the bank. Britain turned it into tax cuts, unemployment cheques and a housing bubble. We unpack the tale of two oil finds, why one country nailed it and the other blew it, and what it says about how nations really make, and lose, their fortunes. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
41 mins
9 July Finished
Alexander Hamilton: How a Caribbean Orphan Built America
250 years on, we ask the question: would America even exist without Alexander Hamilton? We tell the story of the French-speaking outsider who created the dollar, faced down the states, and set the world's biggest economy in motion, before being murdered in one of history's strangest duels. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
38 mins
7 July Finished
Ireland's Silent Sell Off and the Employee Ownership Solution
Every day that the Irish Financial Service Centre is open, they're selling an Irish business into foreign ownership. Since 2018, overseas acquirers have spent over €100 billion buying up Irish companies. I'm joined by Alan Coleman to look at why this is happening. We look at employee ownership trusts as a solution already working in the UK and Canada, the tax barriers holding it back in Ireland, and the surprising historical Irish precedent for the idea. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
31 mins
6 July Finished
The Death of the American Dream
SpaceX just IPO'd, surged, and torched billions of small investors. It's the new American economy. From prediction markets to crypto to day-trading teens, we look at how the US quietly turned itself into the world's biggest casino, and why young Americans are gambling because they've given up on working. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
32 mins
2 July Finished
The Man Who Broke the Global Economy
Alan Greenspan just died at 100, and he might be the most consequential person of the last 30 years that nobody talks about. We unpack the wild story of the jazz clarinettist turned Fed chairman, the Ayn Rand cult he came from, the "Greenspan Put" that quietly rigged Wall Street, and why his fingerprints are all over Ireland's 2008 crash. Plus a strange historical twist: was Alan Greenspan related to the Jewish teenager whose shooting triggered Kristallnacht? Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
41 mins
30 June Finished
