Ho, ho, ho!
Yes, here comes the guy from the North Pole in his red suit again. But as you prepare for the festive season and summer holidays, remember you're not allowed to have too much fun. Your Reserve Bank Governor is trying to engineer a recession to rein in inflation after all. And if we spend too much money that won't help his cause.
Oh forget that. It has been another long and turbulent year so we all deserve to let our hair down. At least a little bit.
As we wish all our contributors, readers, listeners and viewers a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year, here are our annual Interesties Awards. This is where we take a mostly light hearted look at the year that was.
So without further ado, and with a decent dollop of recency bias - favouring recent events over ones earlier this year - here they are.
The "Cool the Jets" Grinch Award: Reserve Bank Governor Adrian Orr.
The Scream/Freddy Krueger Back to Haunt Us Award: Inflation.
Chart of The Year: The valuation of cryptocurrency exchange FTX.
FTX valuation history pic.twitter.com/tPoZt3qq8h
— Trung Phan (@TrungTPhan) November 9, 2022
The Services to the Vegan Cause Award: FTX Chief Executive Sam Bankman-Fried. As reported by Bloomberg as Bankman-Fried is held in a Bahamas prison ahead of likely extradition to the United States to face wire fraud, money laundering and campaign finance charges.
Here's Bloomberg after detailing grim conditions in the Bahamas prison;
One person said Bankman-Fried’s relatives called the prison Tuesday night to ask whether vegan meals could be delivered to him.
The Blink and You Missed Them Award: Liz Truss and Kwasi Kwarteng.
The Mea Culpa After Painting Himself Into a Corner Award: Reserve Bank of Australia Governor Philip Lowe.
After hiking interest rates this year Lowe acknowledged the RBA spending much of 2020 and 2021 saying they wouldn't do this until 2024 was a mistake.
The Potty Mouth of Parliament Award: Jacinda Ardern.
The Generator of the Political Headline of the Year Award: Christopher Luxon for this gem on a Thomas Coughlin NZ Herald article; Christopher Luxon U-turns on U-turn, acknowledging he ‘misspoke’
The Grifter of the Year Award: Donald Trump. Even though he was late to the NFT party...
i’ve wondered what a marvel movie produced by qanon would look like
— ian bremmer (@ianbremmer) December 15, 2022
now i know pic.twitter.com/JcvhwsjTqO
The Jurassic Park Return of the Dinosaur Award: Winston Peters.
The I'm in Power for as Long as I Want to Be Award: Xi Jinping.
The Warmonger Award: Despot Vladimir Putin.
The Causing a Share Market Trading Halt Political Gaffe Award: Wayne Brown.
The Public Relations (PR) Services Award: The NZ Herald for coverage of Max Key.
The I'm Still Not Quite Done With You Yet Award: COVID-19.
The Services to Their Shareholders Award: New Zealand's big four, Aussie owned banks with their combined annual dividends of $4.2 billion this year.
The Getting Acrophobia Award: People with home loans.
The Finally Putting Away the Limbo Bar Award: Savers with bank deposits.
The Big Inflating Balloon Award: New Zealand's now $29.7 billion annual current account deficit.
The Lurking Around a Dark Corner Ready to Kneecap Us Award: Recession.
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