Wall Street jitters identify familiar traits

Amazingly, it is now over a year since we made the trek from Mount Street to George's Dock in the IFSC. It's hard to identify all the changes that have taken place here over that time because they happen so gradually that you're not entirely aware of them. But I guess the fact that our building now has the settled look of something that has been around for 12 months is something in itself. The major change going on right now is the extension of the Harbourmaster Bar which (as regular readers will remember) necessitated the draining of the docks a while ago. It looks like the building will be twice as big again, but I reckon that there's more than twice as many people here now compared with the original days of the IFSC, when it was nothing but a windswept island of concrete.

One of the additions that I was initially very sceptical about was the arrival of two payphones near Wrights. I simply couldn't believe that their location here where people wander around with mobile phones implanted in their ears would be of any practical use whatsoever.

And two days after they arrived I congratulated myself on being right when I noticed a guy standing under the perspex shelter, but actually using his mobile phone to make a call. But since then they have been in use quite often by people surrounded by rucksacks who have just missed a train from Connolly Station.

The one thing that I miss about our previous location (and there aren't many) is that it was a more pleasant area to walk around, particularly during the summer when you could wander along the canal. Being closer to the city centre has some advantages, but walking around dusty streets certainly isn't one of them.

All the same, the facades on these streets continue to change rapidly. Across the river, the whole George's Quay development looks very well. On this side, the new Garda building in Store Street is absolutely fantastic although it is completely destroyed by the fact that hundreds of cars crashed, stolen and Garda are parked (or abandoned) outside it all the time. Not only does it look truly awful, but it makes a mockery of traffic around Store Street. And with Busaras just opposite, the combination is lethal.

I suppose the only consolation is that when a major road rage incident erupts, it is but a short walk to the cells.

The most dreary part of walking around this part of town is to go down Lower Abbey Street. There are some lovely buildings there the Irish Life building which curves around onto Beresford Place, and the old Presbyterian Church, for example but the rest of it is almost unimaginably dull. The dreariest of all is the side of the Abbey Theatre. The front of the theatre was much improved by its refurbishment, but they obviously gave no thought at all to the side, which is just an enormous blank grey wall. I reckon it should be painted.

Murals, perhaps, with scenes from some of the Abbey's productions, might be a more interesting view than what's there already. Or even paintings of trees and flowers which might make things look a little less concrete and a little more tranquil.

Tranquillity is something that people would like to feel about the markets at the moment. I notice that everyone is getting the jitters about Wall Street again. Articles about the possibility of the bubble bursting have been sprouting around like IFSC buildings over the past week or so.

Everyone agrees that the US economy is a miracle of modern technologies and improved business conditions, but everyone knows that we've seen miracles before. And everyone is hoping that the whole Asian crisis has helped to slow down the US economy, just as the pundits thought it might bubble over completely.

The Economist magazine has listed some of the problems for the US as overvalued share prices, a rapid growth in money supply, merger mania and rising property prices. Sounds pretty similar to the Celtic Tiger to me.

The thing about share prices is, though, that each time they fall it's for such a short space of time. The amount of money ready and waiting to go into the market is so huge right now that any small setback in prices is pounced on with glee by those with cash to invest. Same with property prices, despite all the talk about trying to curb them.

The Sunday Times published its Rich List last weekend just so that you could see how much money there is around the place, including Ireland's richest 100.

I suppose there's an endless fascination about wealth (especially if you don't have the kind of dosh the Rich List talks about!), but I can't help feeling that pouring over lists like this is one of the worst exercises in the world. How can you help but feel inadequate when you realise that there are people wandering around the place with net worths of hundreds of millions. Especially when you've just received a nasty surprise on the Visa bill (again) owing to getting carried away in the sales.

Incidentally, if you're at the end of a Rich List, or just miss out on being part of it, do you feel incredibly poor? Or determined to make it next time? Or do you just feel very relieved that no one knows you are actually very well off? And if you do have a net worth of close to £1.5 billion do you still shop around for a bargain even if it's a bargain Lear Jet?