JANUARY
THE year begins with the usual over-optimistic predictions that the world is going to have a great year economically. OK, in 2017 global stock market values rose by a staggering 20 per cent. But that’s what I call a financial bubble, folks. And the thing about bubbles is that those enjoying raking in the cash think the party is going to last forever. It won’t. The one place where shares have started sliding in recent weeks is China. Optimists think that is down to profit-taking. Or, it could be a case of investor jitters that might spread around the globe. Prediction: the Great 2018 Stock Market Panic will set in the moment we have a serious international political crisis. And who better to blunder into one that The Donald. Meanwhile, David Davis says a Brexit deal on the cards. But he refuses to publish these cards.

FEBRUARY
GARY Oldman gets Best Actor Oscar for playing Winston Churchill in Darkest Hour. Rumours say he will play David Davis in new Brexit disaster movie, An Even Darker Hour, and Ruth Davidson will play herself. However, the new movie is shelved as no-one can agree a script or plot line.

MARCH
ITALIAN elections? Who cares, you say. But the future of Europe isn’t really down to Brexit. The tensions inside the EU are explosive and Italy is the weak link. Leading the Italian polls currently is the deeply Eurosceptic Five Star Movement, with Silvio Berlusconi’s Forza Italia coming up fast. Yes, Silvio is back, though he is barred from office as a result of that pesky tax fraud conviction. If Berlusconi’s lot win, expect a pardon and a get-together with Trump. They’re made for each other. Meanwhile, HBO and Italian broadcaster RAI are making a TV mini-series based on Elena Ferrante’s Neapolitan Novels. Prediction: post-war Italy may replace Outlander as the romantic must-view of 2018.

APRIL
WE’VE lived through a decade of quantitative easing, which is economic jargon for keeping interest rates at near zero. That era will come to a definitive end in 2018. There’s a hidden danger. Because returns have been so low for so long, around a trillion dollars worldwide is invested in risky assets. That’s a powderkeg waiting to blow once interest rates rise. Expect more flash crashes – instant cascades of selling as bond and share prices fall. They seem to happen a lot in the spring. This is also Mark Carney’s last year as governor of the Bank of England. Expect the mad Brexiteers to campaign for a more politically sympathetic replacement. Ruth Davidson says she would do the job but she is committed to Holyrood.

MAY
A CERTAIN minor royal wedding will take place. It’s also local election time in England, including all the London boroughs. When these were last fought back in 2014, Nick Clegg led the LibDems, Nigel Farage was king of Ukip, Ed Miliband was pretending to lead the Labour Party, and Dave Cameron was still PM. Expect wins for Labour, although they did well in 2014. The Tories lost a lot of seats to Ukip last time so they may get some back. London should be a key battleground, especially the Tory outer boroughs. If young voters turn out again in big numbers, as they did at the General Election, Jeremy Corbyn will have lots to crow about. Watch Kensington and Chelsea in the aftermath of the (manmade) Grenfell Tower disaster. Richard Leonard says Scottish Labour will wipe floor with SNP in local elections. He has to be reminded these elections are in England only.


JUNE
FIFA World Cup time and a chance to forget politics. Or is it? The matches are taking place in Russia so expect doping scandals, diplomatic tiffs, and Putin taking off his shirt again. Here’s my question: if Panama (population four million) and Iceland (pop 334,000) can all qualify, what happened to Scotland? Note: Spain’s World Cup participation is under threat because the right-wing Rajoy government in Madrid has been trying to interfere in the upcoming election for Fifa’s new president. First Catalonia and now Fifa. Fantasy football prediction: Spain debarred and newly independent Catalonia wins World Cup.

JULY
MILLENNIALS start to enter the workforce in 2018 in their thousands. Unfortunately, they will have to work at supermarket checkouts or for the gig economy at minimum wage, and live in rented flats for the rest of their lives. David Davis promises that after Brexit, millennials will find new, well-paid jobs as the British Empire revives. Tory MP Jacob Rees-Mogg demands that the UK withdraws from 1856 Paris Convention and reintroduces Letters of Marque, allowing entrepreneurial young millennials to earn a living on the high seas as buccaneers. Rees-Mogg says: “The spirit of Sir Francis Drake is still alive and kicking in this Second Elizabethan Age.”

AUGUST
THIS year’s Hajj will see more than two million pilgrims head for Saudi Arabia. Am I the only one who thinks Saudi is an accident waiting to happen? With cocky young Crown Prince Bin Salman in temporary control, the pace of reform had been blistering. In 2018, Saudi cinemas will open their doors for the first time in 35 years. They were shut after the Great Mosque of Mecca was seized by religious militants. The prince has arrested much of the Saudi elite, is Westernising the country at breakneck speed, and is conducting a murderous, unpopular war in Yemen. We are one Hollywood blockbuster away from Saudi Arabia exploding. Then watch the price of North Sea crude sky-rocket.

OCTOBER
AUTUMN is always chilly for the financial markets. Expect the bitcoin rollercoaster to gyrate wildly through 2018. The fact banks and investment funds have been dabbling in bitcoin, is not good news for ordinary mortals. On Saturday the price of a single bitcoin reached a stupid $19,700. Yet it was trading at under $1000 this time last year, and $8000 only a month ago. Most investors haven’t a clue what a bitcoin is — any more than they understood derivatives in 2017. Prediction: the un-hackable bitcoin gets hacked and the market for it implodes.

NOVEMBER
US mid-term elections give Americans the chance to deliver a verdict on the guy with the exotic comb-over. Trump tweets that every contest won by a Democrat was rigged. To restore his fading popularity, The Donald agrees to appear on I’m a Celebrity ... When voted out, he claims result was rigged. David Davis wins. Chancellor Hammond admits rigging the vote to keep Davis in Australian jungle as long as possible. Sadly, Davis is eaten by a crocodile.

DECEMBER
BREXIT negotiations are still going on … and on. Ruth Davidson announces she will stand in a by-election in David Davis’s old constituency. She says she is still committed to Holyrood but England beckons. North Korea conducts a long-range nuclear missile test. Trump orders destruction of North Korean nuclear capability. World War III starts. Alternatively, Nicola declares 2019 will be the Year of indyref2, and we all live happily ever after.