Wall St hit as job losses accelerate March 31, 2010 US stocks fell yesterday as a report showing a surprising drop in private-sector employment stoked concerns about the health of the labor market two days before the government’s key jobs data. ADP Employer Services data showed US private-sector employers unexpectedly cut jobs in March. The Dow Jones industrial average dropped 50.79 points, or 0.47 per [...]
Providers make a dash for share of ETC market March 31, 2010 WHEN it was announced at the end of last year that investment vehicles traded on exchanges, mostly in the form of index-tracking funds, had passed the $1 trillion mark globally, it was a sign that listed products were growing in popularity. But while exchange-traded funds (ETFs) have made their mark already here in Europe, it [...]
INVESTORS’ GLOSSARY March 31, 2010 ARBITRAGEUR You may have heard the term arbitrageur – it is a type of trader who tries to benefit from price inefficiencies in the market. An arbitrage trade requires executing two trades simultaneously that off-set each other. This allows the trader to capture the “risk-free” profits. For example, an arbitrageur may look at a stock [...]
LISTED PRODUCT NEWS March 31, 2010 RBS OFFERS MORE INDICES RBS has recently launched two new covered call warrants on the German Dax stock index and the South African FTSE/JSE top 40. The Dax index is a good way to trade the global economic recovery due to the number of manufacturing companies that are included in the Dax. Likewise, the FTSE [...]
THE TIPSTER March 31, 2010 SATELLITE communications provider Inmarsat was one of the worst performers on the FTSE 100 on Tuesday after hopes faded that its largest shareholder, Harbinger Capital, will be able to afford a takeover. After rising to a high of 797p earlier this year, this pullback could push the stock as low as 650p if any more [...]
Algos boost your trading but always read the label March 30, 2010 WHERE professional traders venture, retail traders won’t be far behind, anxious to pick up on the latest developments in technology and strategy. Algorithmic trading is no exception – there have been recent signs that individuals are more and more interested in using algorithms in their foreign exchange trading. Deutsche Bank’s retail foreign exchange trading arm [...]
Fiscal face-offs offer a silver lining to pound’s feeble state March 30, 2010 ONE lasting impact of this recession is that it has named and shamed those economies that have unsustainably high fiscal deficits. This is a major theme for the foreign exchange markets since traditionally high debt levels have meant weak currencies for the countries involved. Among those which will continue to be weak are the US [...]
DOLLAR RALLY AGAINST YEN TO CONTINUE March 30, 2010 WHILE the currency world was fixated on the euro and the Greek drama unfolding in Brussels last week, the stealth story in the market was the sudden rise in US dollar-yen which came close to hitting yearly highs as US interest rates spiked unexpectedly. Relatively weak US Treasury auctions sent yields on the 10 year [...]
FOREX FLASH March 30, 2010 CHINESE REVALUATION SAGA CONTINUES BlueGold Capital Management’s Stephen Jen said yesterday in a client note that China may refloat the yuan next month to counter the criticism that it is giving its exporting firms an unfair advantage. A revaluation “should help diffuse much of the risks associated with trade protectionism and allow China to resume [...]
The Tipster March 30, 2010 AN UPWARD revision to the UK’s fourth quarter GDP figure helped to boost sterling yesterday. The upward revision was due to stronger output in the construction and manufacturing sectors. Sterling received another boost from credit rating agency Standard and Poor’s which maintained its triple ‘A’ rating on the UK, which bodes well for sterling in [...]