Obama’s new act will prove costly for City firms June 15, 2010 PARTNER, WITHERS LLP ON 18 March 2010 President Obama signed the Hiring Incentives to Restore Employment (HIRE) Act, creating far-reaching client identification and disclosure requirements for every City bank, financial institution, brokerage house and fund structure. While the act is intended to boost US employment through tax breaks for US businesses, it also contains revenue-raising [...]
OFT should look at anticompetitive activity June 15, 2010 PARTNER, JONES DAY LLP EARLIER this year the Office of Fair Trading (OFT) published a report looking at the competition implications of firms taking minority interests in their competitors. Now the results are in, it looks likely that the regulator will take a closer look at this area. The report examines minority shareholdings, interlocking directorships [...]
Tesco on special offer after being oversold June 14, 2010 TESCO share prices tumbled to 397p last week after the announcement that chief executive Sir Terry Leahy was to step down after 14 years at the helm. Sales data released today is expected to be lacklustre, and combined with an expected weak consumer environment in the UK, Tesco’s margins in the near future look vulnerable [...]
TECHNICALS DRIVING THE RECENT RALLY June 14, 2010 CFD MARKET STRATEGIST, GFT WE HAVE seen a fair recovery in global equities over the past few days. Even Friday’s terrible retail sales numbers from the US weren’t considered bad enough to dampen renewed risk appetite. Traders concentrated on the modest improvement in consumer sentiment and used it as an excuse to buy stocks, giving [...]
Commodities should take off later this year June 14, 2010 MARKETS tend to react quickly to bad news. Last month, after fears that the Greek debt crisis could spread across Europe and dent the outlook for global growth, the markets traded lower as investors sold risky assets. Commodities – sensitive to the global growth outlook – were hit hard. For example, the oil price fell [...]
CFD ANALYST PICKS June 14, 2010 TECHNICAL STRATEGIST JOEL KRUGER My pick: Sell FTSE 100 at 5,300 Expertise: Technical analysis Average time frame of trades: 5-10 days The market has been very well supported on dips below 5,000 with the latest bounce now likely to open up additional gains back towards the recent range highs of 5,260 over the coming sessions. [...]
The early bird catches the worm: how traders use leading indicators June 14, 2010 JUST when we thought those fragile green shoots of recovery in the developed world were starting to flower, a recent swath of disappointing data has dashed traders’ hopes of stronger growth. Besides the ongoing sovereign debt crisis in the Eurozone, the recovery in the US jobs market has been much weaker than expected and Finland [...]
FTSE rises for fourth day in a row as miners offset a sharp decline for BP June 14, 2010 BRITAIN’S top share index closed higher yesterday for a fourth straight day, led by miners buoyed by firmer metals prices and offsetting a sharp fall in BP. The FTSE 100 index closed up 38.45 points, or 0.7 per cent, at 5,202.13, its highest close since 3 June. Mining stocks added the most points to the [...]
Wall St surrenders gains as Moody’s cuts Greece June 14, 2010 US STOCKS ended little changed in a low-volume session yesterday after a downgrade of Greece’s debt took the wind out of the market’s sails. Equities have been sensitive to debt problems in Greece and other European nations in recent months on concerns the Eurozone’s fiscal problems will hamper a global economic recovery. The Dow Jones [...]
Be discerning about Europe’s banking sector June 13, 2010 THE last two years have been cataclysmic for the global banking sector. Yet most banks managed to stay afloat during the financial crisis and have returned to profitability this year. And after the wave of volatility that hit the markets in recent weeks, banking stocks are beginning to look cheap. But should investors be buying [...]
