Archives of “pound sterling” tag

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Euro Stoxx index falls for the first time in 11 trading sessions

  
Analysis, Global Indices
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European indices move lower today

The major European indices have closed lower today.

  • The Euro Stoxx index fell for the first time in 11 trading sessions (10 higher closes).
  • The German Dax came off of a record levels.
  • The France’s CAC could not reach its all-time high from 2000
A look at the provisional closes shows:
  • German DAX, -0.5%
  • France’s CAC, -0.9%
  • UK’s FTSE 100, -1.0%
  • Spain’s Ibex, -0.83%
  • Italy’s FTSE MIB, -0.85%
The Euro Stoxx index fell -0.7%.
In other markets as London/European traders look to exit:
  • Spot gold plus $5.50 or 0.32% at $1784.85.
  • Spot silver is up for cents or 0.21% $23.75
  • WTI crude oil futures are down $0.35 or -0.49% at $67.60
  • bitcoin is trading down $773 at $46,248. The digital currency traded above $48,000 today
In the US stock market, the major indices are lower but off their lowest levels:
  • Dow is down -79 points or -0.22% at 35436
  • S&P index is down -16.29 points or -0.36% at 4451.53
  • NASDAQ is down 125 points -0.85% 14697.65
In the forex market, the CHF is now the strongest of the majors while the CAD remains the weakest. The USD is mixed with gains vs the CAD, AUD and NZD and declines vs the JPY and CHF. The greenback is near unchanged levels vs the EUR and GBP.

Some of the most successful traders and best trader in the world to learn from are:

  
Analysis, Education
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  • Jesse Livermore is known for both colossal gains and losses. He made $million in 1929, and by 1934 he had lost all of it (an example that confirms the huge risk involved in stock trading).
  •  George Soros is one of history’s most successful stock and forex traders. He gained the nickname “the man who broke the bank of England” when he made $1 billion profit from selling $10 billion worth of pounds. He is the chairman of Soros Fund Management.
  • ​Richard Dennis is a successful commodity trader based in Chicago. He made an estimated $200 million over a period of ten years from market speculating.
  • ​Paul Tudor Jones became famous after the market crash of 1987 to make a whopping $100 million from shorting stocks. He is the founder of Tudor Investment Corporation.
  • ​William Delbert Gann is known for developing technical indicators like Gann Angles and the Square of 9. He was a trader who used market forecasting techniques based on astrology, geometry, and mathematics.
  • ​Bill Lipschutz turned $12000 investment in the stock market to $25000 in a few months but lost all of it. He then moved to forex trading, where he has made over $300 million.
  • ​John R. Taylor Jr started as a political analyst for a chemical bank before becoming their forex analyst. He is the owner of FX Concepts, which is a currency managing firm.
  • ​Stanley Druckenmiller is a successful trader who started as an oil analyst for the Pittsburgh National Bank. He was a part of a deal while working at George Soros that raked in $1 billion.
  • ​Andrew Krieger is one of the best trader in the world. He sold kiwi, a New Zealand currency, a trade valued more than the total currency supply. He got revenue of $300 million from the trade.
  • ​Michael Marcus is one of the best and most successful forex traders in the world. Legend Ed Seykota trained him. During the presidency of Ronald Reagan, Marcus held positions of almost $300 million in German marks.

Sunday Times reports the UK “plans for a £30bn tax raid on the wealthy”

  
  Analysis
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Monday 31 August 2020 is a holiday in the UK, a good time for getting this sort of bad news dribbling out.

UK press with the report,
  • Chancellor Rishi Sunak has his Treasury officials drawing up plans for a £30bn tax raid on the wealthy, businesses, pensions and foreign aid
  • proposals would be part of the budget in November
  • planning to raise capital gains tax
  • and corporation tax (from 19% to 24%)

UK Times link is here (may be gated).

ps. Reuters report here is ungated

Monday 31 August 2020 is a holiday in the UK, a good time for getting this sort of bad news dribbling out.

Japan GDP preliminary for Q2 -7.8% q/q (vs. expected -7.5%)

  
Analysis, Economy
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Japan GDP preliminary for Q2 2020, capturing the impact of the COVID-19 outbreak and response

GDP sa -7.8% q/q  , a miss on already ugly low expectations

  • expected -7.5%, prior -0.6%

GDP annualised sa -27.8% q/q (ps when you see screaming headlines that Japan’s economy has shrunken 30% …. it hasn’t, but this is what the economically illiterate are referring to – you’ll know better)

  • expected -26.9%, prior -2.2%

GDP nominal -7.4% q/q

  • expected -6.5%, prior -0.5%

GDP deflator (an inflation indication) %

  • expected 1.7%, prior 0.9%

Private consumption -8.2%

  • expected -6.9% q/q, prior -0.8%

Business spending -1.5% … if there is some not quite so bad news to take away from the data release this smaller than expected drop in capex is it

  • expected -4.0%, prior -1.7%
This is the 3rd consecutive quarter of GDP contraction for Japan.
Japan is a net exporters, the decline in demand offshore has taken a heavy toll on shipments – Q2 exports fell at their fastest since Q1 2009 (GFC influence) and external demand has subtracted the biggest hit from GDP since 1980 (based on comparable data).
ps. yen is doing little on the data release.

CFTC commitment of traders: EUR longs increase to 200K (all time largest long position).

  
Analysis, Forex
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Weekly FX speculative positioning data from the CFTC

  • EUR long 200K vs 180K long last week. Longs increased by 20K
  • GBP short 3K vs 15K short last week. Shorts trimmed by 12K
  • JPY long 27K vs 31K long last week. Longs trimmed by 4K
  • CHF long 17K vs 12K long last week. Longs increase by 5K
  • AUD short 1K vs 1K short last week. Shorts trimmed by 4K
  • NZD 0K vs 1K short last week. Shorts trimmed by 1K
  • CAD short 30k vs 23K short last week. Shorts increased by 6K

Highlights:

  • EUR longs continue to rise and are at new record long position at 200K. The largest short position all time is at -227K
  • GBP position has been whittled down to near unchanged after being short by 36K at the beginning of June 2020
  • AUD and NZD speculative positions are near unchanged
  • CAD shorts are the more or less, the only short currency position (long USD position).
Weekly FX speculative positioning data from the CFTC

Full statement of the BOE August monetary policy meeting decision

  
  Analysis
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The full statement by the BOE on its August policy decision

The Bank of England’s Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) sets monetary policy to meet the 2% inflation target, and in a way that helps to sustain growth and employment. In that context, its challenge at present is to respond to the economic and financial impact of the Covid-19 pandemic. At its meeting ending on 4 August 2020, the MPC voted unanimously to maintain Bank Rate at 0.1%. The Committee voted unanimously for the Bank of England to continue with its existing programmes of UK government bond and sterling non-financial investment-grade corporate bond purchases, financed by the issuance of central bank reserves, maintaining the target for the total stock of these purchases at £745 billion.

The Committee’s projections for activity and inflation are set out in the accompanying August Monetary Policy Report. Although recent developments suggest a less weak starting point for the Committee’s latest projections, it is unclear how informative they are about how the economy will perform further out. The outlook for the UK and global economies remains unusually uncertain. It will depend critically on the evolution of the pandemic, measures taken to protect public health, and how governments, households and businesses respond to these factors. The MPC’s projections assume that the direct impact of Covid-19 on the economy dissipates gradually over the forecast period. Given the inherent uncertainties regarding the evolution of the pandemic, the MPC’s medium-term projections are a less informative guide than usual.

Global activity has strengthened over recent months, although it generally remains below its level in 2019 Q4. Covid-19 has continued to spread rapidly within a number of emerging market economies, however, and there has been a renewed rise in cases in many advanced economies. (more…)

ECB meet this week (preview) but they are already driving the higher euro

  
Analysis, Forex
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As was noted during the US time zone, EUR/USD pierced 1.14. A factor that appears to have flown under the radar is this sign of (continued) aggressive policy support from the ECB, that is:
  • ECB corporate bond-buying was up 3.3bn EUR last week, which is around 400m higher than the previous record high over the past 4 years operation of the Bank’s corporate bond purchasing program
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ps, ICYMI, the EU Recovery Fund will be the discussion point of note for markets in the ECB meeting Thursday
  • financing totalling up to EUR750 bn, split between grants of EUR500 billion and loans of EUR250 billion
  • Netherlands, Austria Denmark and Sweden want to reduce the amount of funds distributed as grants

European shares end the session with declines

  
Analysis, Global Indices
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UK FTSE outperforms

The European shares are ending the session with declines.  The UK FTSE 100 the better than others on the GBPs weakness.
The provisional closes are showing:
  • German DAX, -1.06%
  • France’s CAC, -1.25%
  • UK’s FTSE 100, -0.10%
  • Spain’s Ibex, -1.02%
  • Italy’s FTSE MIB, -0.7%
In the European debt debt market, the benchmark 10 year yields are ending lower across the board. Declines range from -2.7 basis points to -3.6 basis points:
UK FTSE outperforms_

In other markets as European traders look to exit:

  • spot gold is trading up $6.05 or 0.34% at $1808.82. The low extended to $1790.79. The high for the day is near current levels at $1809.74
  • WTI crude oil futures are trading up $0.31 or 0.77% at $40.41 for the August contract. The September contract is also higher by $0.33 or 0.82% at $40.65
In the US stock market the Dow industrial average outperforms while the NASDAQ index get whipped around and volatile trading. The current snapshot shows
  • S&P index up 12.8 points or 0.41% at 3168.16
  • NASDAQ index down 2.6 points or -0.02% at 10391.16
  • Dow industrial average up 288 points or 1.11% at 26374
The NASDAQ index has whipped around in with the low falling -2.01%. The high extended up 0.42%.  The point range is around 250 points from low to high.

UK 2-year bond yields briefly fall below that of Japan’s for the first time ever

  
  Analysis
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The Japanification of the gilt market continues

UK Japan

Japan is pretty much the benchmark for low-to-no yields in the global bond market and when another country reaches that point, it sort of rings an alarm bell to investors that there isn’t much attractiveness/value in said yields anymore.
UK long-term yields fell below their Japanese counterparts at the end of last month but now we’re seeing the front-end of the curve follow suit as well.
The rally in gilts could either be suggestive that investors are fine with being more risk averse or that those buying are pretty much stuck due to regulatory constraints.
But whatever the case is, don’t expect value investors to be searching for scrumptious returns in the UK any time soon. In turn, that may be another reason to add to the list of headwinds for the pound and the UK economy in general.

Senior IOC member says Tokyo Olympics could be cancelled due to coronavirus

  
  Analysis
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Dick Pound said that if it proves too dangerous to hold the Olympics in Tokyo this summer because of the coronavirus outbreak, organizers are more likely to cancel it altogether than to postpone or move it.

Pound is a senior member of the International Olympic Committee
“In and around that time, I’d say folks are going to have to ask: ‘Is this under sufficient control that we can be confident about going to Tokyo or not?'” he said in an exclusive interview with The Associated Press.
Link here for more
Yep, that’d be bad news for Japan indeed.Dick Pound said that if it proves too dangerous to hold the Olympics in Tokyo this summer because of the coronavirus outbreak, organizers are more likely to cancel it altogether than to postpone or move it.
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