Nailing his predictions to the door, he forecasts with others, unemployment to rise a further 700,000 and retail sales continuing to fall. There will also be further falls in average house prices, although not so dramatic in Scotland,  having never been so over-valued here as in other parts of the UK. These will continue to fall until they return to their historic ratio of 2.9 times annual earnings.

Parsons reassured his audience that economic growth will resume at the beginning of 2010. It will not be stellar growth fuelled by excessive government and household debt, but rather a steady and sustainable growth of around 2% per annum.

Parsons joined nabCapital (like Clydesdale Bank, part of the National Australia Bank Group) in 2007 as head of Markets Strategy, based in London. He has 24 years experience in Foreign Exchange and Money Markets, having previously held posts as Global Head FX Research, head of Macro Research and Group Economist.

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