A century ago, petroleum - what we call oil - was just an obscure commodity; today it is almost as vital to human existence as water.

Losing your capital is like losing your trousers. It is a real humiliation, and one not to be soon repeated.

Profits in business always depend on the rate of interest: the higher the interest, the higher the rate of profit required.

By pouring money and goods into devastated regions, foreign aid workers sometimes compound the disruption and debauch the survivors.

Soaring prices for crude oil, falling production surpluses, wild speculation in commodities, a rush into the precious metals, turmoil in the Middle East, assertive oil producers: it is 1973-74 all over again, and at dictation speed.

In modern society, where most people live in cities, and where both needs and wishes are absolved through the same remote agency - money - the distinction between wishes and needs has altogether vanished.

Saudi Arabia operates according to the belief that God made young men and women so utterly and completely without self-control that they must be physically segregated every moment of the day and night.