As if further proof was not required here, it seems, is the final piece of evidence. Smoking kills you.
[I took this photograph at my wife’s Grandmother’s funeral in Scotland]
Of course, in a recession, smoking may be good for you. Or tobacco, or other defensive stocks might be anyway. All of which means that if you want to live a long while, don’t smoke. But if you want to have a few bob to spend during the last years of your long life don’t insist that your pension fund divests of its holdings in tobacco. Or so this 6 month stock chart for BAT seems to suggests…