FEW will have escaped the historic events this week when Barack Obama was sworn in as the 44th president of the United States.

With his predecessor, George W Bush, being widely blamed for not taking action sooner for the collapse of the US property market, Mr Obama is being seen as the saviour of the US. There is a lot of weight on his shoulders.

You may be thinking, what does this have to do with us? The answer is quite simple – everything. What happens in the US has historically been the catalyst for knock-on events around the world. As the largest economy in the world, this means its mistakes are felt further afield. The financial collapse of the past 18 months is a perfect example.

In 2001, I worked for the Yorkshire Bank, owned by National Australia Bank (NAB).

At this time, NAB pulled out of the US market after losing $3.1bn when it sold National Michigan Bank and HomeSide Lending because of the falling US property market. This went relatively unnoticed at the time, but looking back, it was a clear sign of things to come. In today’s terms, it would be seen as quite a shrewd move compared with some of the losses currently being reported by the world’s banks. The warning signs were there, but nothing changed.

This US collapse eventually filtered to the UK, then Europe and before we knew it, we were in a global economic crisis.

Hopefully, this “ostrich” approach may now be in the past as Mr Obama has promised to jumpstart the economy in his manifesto.

With the correlation between the two nations clear to see, it is in all of our interests that the state of the US economy is improved as quickly as possible.

Should Obama fulfil his promise, or at worst, only instil a little confidence and stability to the markets, then you can rest assured that it will not take long for us to see the benefits over here. Until this time, I genuinely believe there is very little that our Government or the Bank of England can do to control our economy.

■ Karl Pemberton is director of Active Financial Services, of Guisborough. He can be contacted on 01287-632367 or through activefinancial services.co.uk and will be answering readers’ financial questions in a bi-weekly column. Topics you would like to see featured in his column can be sent to echobusiness@ nne.co.uk The information contained in this response should not be relied upon as general advice and is for general information only. We always recommend you seek independent financial advice before embarking on any financial decisions.