Welcome to Wealth Daily's new weekend review. At the end of each week we'll take a look at the week that was and what's ahead, along with what you may have missed from our free sister sites, Gold World, Energy and Capital, and our free blogs. Enjoy.

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The UK has boasted an annual GDP growth rate of 2.5% for years, ending 2007 with 3% growth.

But with a severe credit crunch, a crippled housing market, and a cutback in consumer spending, growth becomes a problem. Worrisome is that UK consumers depend more on credit than US consumers do.

British finance minister Alistair Darling just announced that the economy would grow by 1.75% to 2.25% in 2008, cutting back on an earlier forecast of 2% to 2.5%. The British economy grew by 0.6% in Q3 and Q4 2007, supporting the case for more interest rate cuts from the Bank of England.

Yep, for quite some time, the UK economy has been in trouble. But who didn't see that coming? It was November 2007 when the Bank of England's chief economist warned that the effect of the credit crunch on banks may only be the tip of the iceberg.

It was early February 2007 when we saw the beginnings of a U.S. sub-prime meltdown that would soon wreck the future of housing, easy credit, and people who bought homes they couldn't afford. Now, months later, homebuilders and lenders are knee-deep in debt. And there's no real chance for a housing turnaround until 2010, at the earliest.

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But just as the U.S. has struggled for some control over sub-prime, Britain had to get aggressive or risk a tumultuous economic future. In the UK, more than 90% of all mortgages are adjustable-rate or floating-rate mortgages. More than 1.5 million homeowners are considered sub-prime, and another four million are seen as high risk because of imperfect credit histories.

On top of mortgage debt, British consumers owe $2.8 trillion on credit cards, hold 2.8 credit or debit cards, and have a household debt-to-income ratio of 1.62, as compared to 1.42 in the U.S. And research suggests that one in four people are either struggling with debt or feel that their debt is unmanageable.

The availability of cheap debt is coming back to haunt them.

Home prices are tumbling. Foreclosures have reached their highest levels since 1999. And more than a million homeowners have ARMs that are expected to reset higher in the next twelve months. The UK Financial Services Authority recently reported (per the Wall Street Journal) that "homeowners whose monthly mortgage payments are resetting this year could face an increase of $411 at a time when they are already digesting a sharp rise in energy and food costs."

It got so bad that Citigroup announced it would cancel the credit cards of more than 160,000 customers deemed to be "too risky."

Is this the calm before the storm? Is the UK economy headed for a bigger meltdown than what we've seen?

Unfortunately, the latest news from the Times of London suggests that even more troubles may be ahead. According to the Times, the second largest UK mortgage lender, Nationwide, has announced it would turn away business to get more control over "the amount it lends."

In an attempt to become less competitive, Nationwide is increasing the "rates on its tracker deals by more than half a percentage point," said the Times. "This will come as an added blow to homeowners already facing large increases in their monthly mortgage repayments."

That means 1.4 homeowners will likely be saddled with higher rates at the end of current fixed-term deals. It's a move that could easily be mirrored by other banks, making the repayment burden much worse.

While we're not sure of Nationwide's current stability issues, we do know the Bank of England is far behind the curve, needing to catch up to the U.S. Fed with more than just liquidity injections or aggressive rate cutting campaigns to tackle the problem.

And the downhill snowball has only started to roll . . .

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The Bank of England is already signaling another rate cut. As a result of economic woes, banks turning away business, and further rate cuts, we expect to see more downside in the British pound.

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For the week of March 24, 2008, here's what we covered in Wealth Daily and elsewhere.

Oil in Egypt: Egypt's Energy-Fed Economic Boom
The deserts of North Africa, where some of the fiercest battles of World War II were fought, are now the last frontiers of light, sweet crude. Libya has shown the area's potential, with that country now officially holding Africa's largest proven crude reserves (41 billion barrels). Meanwhile, right next door in Egypt, bountiful underground oil is buried under 22 million land mines courtesy of the Desert Fox, Gen. Erwin Rommel, and his enemies in the British Eighth Army.

The Energy Picture: The Big Picture on Energy, Part 1: I'm Changing My Name to JP Morgan
The bottom line is that we're no longer in a trading environment that makes sense based on fundamentals. We're now in a world that lives and dies on capital flows, a fairly esoteric world that most investors don't follow, and one that is heavily influenced by hedge funds and other big money players.

Junior Mining Companies: The One Sector to Emerge, Profitably, Once the Dust Settles
Events last week have prompted me to send out this communication regarding the sudden collapse of the precious metals market. Says Greg McCoach: Let's take a look at what caused the collapse and why junior mining companies are the one glimmer of hope amid the chaos.

JP Morgan Chase's "Cheats & Tricks": The Seamy Underbelly
Cheats, tricks, and lies. That was the seamy underbelly of the housing boom--a land of winks and nods. In it, borrowers lied, fibbed and fudged their way to ill-gotten gains. And all along the road, willing loan officers coached them and looked the other way. Sure, it was wrong. But if that was how a deal got done, then what was the problem? It was the new mortgage paradigm and its mantra was simple-"whatever it takes."

Global Real Estate Investments: Three Ways to Play the Path of Progress Right Now
Lief Simon of Global Real Estate Ventures is not only a long-time friend of mine, he is one of the best international real-estate investors I know. I've asked Lief to tell you where the opportunities are in global real estate.

The FPX IPO Index: Why FPX Is Still a Buy in a Slumbering IPO Market
Eight trading days prior to the Visa IPO, we spoke of the First Trust IPOX-100 Index (FPX) as a possible beneficiary of the record-breaking IPO . . . and we were dead on. The FPX Index popped about $1.50 on the day of the IPO and is likely to move higher along with Visa.

Investing in Municipal Bonds: The Latest Move by the World's Greatest Investors
When all three of them decide that one beaten-down corner of the market has suddenly reached the value stage, it's hard not to take a look at what they are up to--even if those investments are as about as exciting as watching paint dry.

Clean Energy ETFs: The Nitty-Gritty on Clean Energy Exchange Traded Funds
Clean energy ETFs and the Dow have undergone a complete role reversal. The Dow has lost about 4%. The previously mentioned ETFs have lost anywhere from 14% to 31%. But with credit worries beginning to ease--if only briefly--it may be time for these funds to take off again.

Cree Jumps on Buyout Rumor
After a pullback sub-$28, shares of Cree are skyrocketing this morning on buyout rumors. According to Briefing.com, "The chatter moving CREE is that an industry magazine plans to run a story that IBM is in final discussions to buy CREE in the range of $38-$39. We are not familiar with the magazine being cited (Integrated Photonics Magazine) . . ."

Taiwan Playing Catch Up . . . What to Buy Now . . .
On the Ma win, Taiwan could achieve an annual growth rate of 6% with a 3% reduction in unemployment by 2012, and there are hopes of stronger trade and economic ties with China. Better still, Ma hopes to have an immediate impact on the economy in his first 100 days by "opening up Taiwan to mainland China tourism." He also has plans for a $130 billion eight-year spending program for infrastructure.

That's it for this week. For more, visit your free EnergyandCapital.com, GoldWorld.com, and WealthDaily.com.

Have a great weekend,

Ian L. Cooper