Iceland wins economic World Cup!

The World Cup has only just kicked off, but a surprise winner has already emerged: Iceland. That’s according to a study looking at which of the countries competing in Russia scores most on an array of indicators of economic and financial health. The report released yesterday by Denmark’s Saxo Bank amounts to a yellow card to Latin America’s footballing powers, warning that yawning levels of inequality hamper their efforts to translate on-field success into the real world. In contrast, according to the evaluation by eight number-crunchers led by the bank’s senior quantitative analyst, the match-ups would see Iceland defeat Denmark in the economic World Cup final. Saxo chief economist and chief investment officer Steen Jakobsen laughed off suggestions that the study showed a pro-Nordic bias. “I’m no big Denmark fan, in economics or football, but we did it entirely as a mathematical exercise,” he told AFP by phone from Copenhagen.