Archive for October, 2011

The EUR/USD spreads pushed towards a 3 week high as the markets became more optimistic on a concrete deal by the end of the month for Greece and the Eurozone. IMF officials indicated that Greece will get an 8 billion euro loan next month despite the fact that it will miss key deficit targets....
Read more »

The leaders of the Eurozone put together packages to bail out another two banks yesterday following on from the €4bn rescue of the bankrupt Belgian lender Dexia. Denmark’s Max Bank and Greece’s Proton Bank both sought government aid to avoid collapse after the bailout of Dexia which saw Belgium, Luxembourg and France agree...
Read more »

The FTSE 100 closed at its highest level in the last five weeks, briefly breaking back above the 5400 level in the process, as traders took confidence from the bailout of troubled Franco-Belgian bank Dexia and the pledge by Angela Merkel and Nicolas Sarkozy last night to provide sustainable solutions to the Eurozone problems...
Read more »

The market turmoil continues as the bad news mounts up. Failure to achieve concrete results from the meeting of Eurozone finance ministers this week together with intensifying banking sector concerns and additional quantitative easing in the UK left markets nervous for the coming weeks and months ahead. Apart from the sell-off in global equities...
Read more »

There is genuine uncertainty over the outcome of the two central bank meetings later today. First up is the Bank of England, who cannot lower interest rates but can restart the printing presses with the aim of holding down long-term rates. Adam Posen has been the lone voice on the MPC calling for further...
Read more »

The Eurozone’s escalating financial crisis continued to control the markets yesterday as more fear of a Greek default led to growing concerns over the global recovery. The prospect of a Greek default heightened after a delay in the next package of aid due from the EU’s IMF fund. There was more bad news for Europe...
Read more »

Mark Twain famously said “history doesn’t repeat itself, but it does rhyme”. If he is right we may be in for a very bumpy ride over the next few weeks. Today we find ourselves in a very similar position to October 2008, and we know what happened in the post Lehman financial markets. The...
Read more »

The rally following Germany’s approval of changes to the EFSF bailout fund proved to be short-lived. Even though the outcome of the vote was not particularly unexpected, political worries were reduced by the fact that Chancellor Merkel gained support from within her coalition. Spread trading markets were also helped by a bigger than expected...
Read more »