How to kill two birds with one great stock

Demand for commodities in emerging markets could easily stoke inflation in the West, says Bengt Saelensminde. Here, he picks one fund that should insulate you against rising commodity prices while giving you all the security of a bond.

This was a headline in Monday's Telegraph: 'Mortgage rates may climb to 14 per cent within two years'. Now, I'm always saying that financial markets can turn suddenly. But this headline strikes me as blatant scaremongering.

The story's based on a report by The Policy Exchange think tank saying that base rates could go back up to 8% in the next couple of years. Then a personal finance website (Moneyfacts) took another great leap and suggested that if rates go to 8%, then mortgages could go to 14%! But it would be suicide for the Bank of England to jack rates up to 8% now. Personal and business bankruptcies would make the credit crunch of 2008 look like a walk in the park.

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Bengt graduated from Reading University in 1994 and followed up with a master's degree in business economics.

 

He started stock market investing at the age of 13, and this eventually led to a job in the City of London in 1995. He started on a bond desk at Cantor Fitzgerald and ended up running a desk at stockbroker's Cazenove.

 

Bengt left the City in 2000 to start up his own import and beauty products business which he still runs today.