Brokers remain bullish but still wary on stocks
INSTITUTIONAL brokers in the world’s financial centres remain cautiously bullish despite a slight dip in stock market performance at the end of last week.
European shares hit earlier a 10-month high before falling back on Friday, the FTSE 100 closing down almost one per cent at 4,714. On Wall Street the Dow Jones Industrial Average lost almost one per cent to finish at 9,321.
According to the Trade Idea Monitor produced by YouDevise, which measures sentiment among brokers, the five-day average was 53.4, down marginally from the week before. A figure over 50 is bullish, under 50 is bearish. The sentiment index showed that sentiment in North America remains slightly bullish while in Britain brokers are slightly bearish.
The survey also highlights how brokers are split between long and short trading ideas. It remained in favour of long ideas with 65.68 per cent of the total. In August to date, the percentage of long ideas is 65.2 per cent and over the year to do 59.46 per cent.