Merryn Talks Money

Merryn and John discuss worrying signals from the stock market, the physical constraints facing the AI boom, China’s growing appetite for gold and an unexpected consequence of the data-center buildout.
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As the UK's buy-to-let marks its 30th anniversary, we still find ourselves asking: is it worth it? This week, Merryn Somerset Webb and Aneisha Beveridge, head of research at Hamptons, discuss how it went from accessible investment strategy to heavily taxed and regulated. They explore multiple factors that changed the market and what it now takes to make buy-to-let worthwhile.
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Merryn Somerset Webb speaks with Daniel Susskind, senior research associate at the Institute for Ethics in AI at the University of Oxford and a member of the UK government’s expert panel on AI and the future of work. AI is expected to transform the job market, potentially upending many of the traditional educational pathways that have long led students into established professions. As those routes begin to look increasingly uncertain, how should young people prepare for the world of work that awaits them? In his book, What Should My Children Do?, Susskind seeks to answer that question, offering a framework for how children — and adults — can best prepare for an evolving labor market with AI at its center.
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It’s interest-rate week, with central banks around the world making key decisions. Merryn Somerset Webb and John Stepek discuss what rising rates mean for markets, government debt and your money — and why financial repression and currency devaluation could be coming back into focus.
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Merryn Somerset Webb sits down with Sarah Coles, head of personal finance at AJ Bell, to discuss how gifting surplus income can help reduce your inheritance tax bill ahead of changes to the IHT treatment of pensions in April 2027.
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