London Report: FTSE dips after HSBC’s profits miss forecasts August 5, 2013 BRITAIN’S benchmark equity index fell yesterday, pulled down by HSBC after the heavyweight bank’s interim profits missed forecasts, giving HSBC shares their worst day in well over a year. The blue-chip FTSE 100 index closed down 0.4 per cent, or 28.29 points, at 6,619.58 points. The decline marked its second consecutive fall after a four-day [...]
New York Report: Slow day on Wall Street as shares decline August 5, 2013 THE DOW and the S&P 500 dipped yesterday in the thinnest volume so far this year, following their record closing highs last week as a lack of major news left the market directionless. Although about 100 companies in the S&P 500 are still scheduled to report earnings, the season is winding down sharply after last [...]
CNBC Comment: The subtleties of forward guidance August 5, 2013 THERE was little of significance from the Bank of England’s meeting last week, except for a small statement guiding us towards this week’s inflation report. But tomorrow’s quarterly forecast will be overshadowed by a decision about forward guidance. In July, the Bank’s Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) said rises in market rate expectations were unwarranted – [...]
Daily FX: Analyst picks August 5, 2013 CURRENCY STRATEGIST CHRIS VECCHIO My pick: Closed (half) short Aussie dollar-dollar Expertise: Fundamental and technical analysis Average time frame of trades: A few hours to a few weeks The swaps market suggests a 91 per cent chance of a 0.25 per cent rate cut; so focus is on the policy statement. Reserve Bank of Australia [...]
Any Other Business – 06/08 August 5, 2013 City and rugby stars collided last week at the launch of rugby player-turned-broker-turned-entrepreneur Peter Winterbottom’s new venture, the specialist rugby communications agency Full Contact. Wints played rugby for both England and the Lions – before broking at Creditex – and the guests at City favourite, the central London rooftop bar Aqua, seemed to reflect his [...]
Fed’s Fisher says QE taper should begin this Autumn August 5, 2013 Head of the Dallas Federal Reserve Bank has said that the Fed is nearly ready to begin tapering off its quantitative easing programme, and that he believes this should begin this autumn. In prepared remarks at a conference of pension fund administrators, Fisher was highly critical of the quantitative easing policy for doing little on [...]
IMF urges France to slow pace of spending reduction amid weak growth forecasts August 5, 2013 The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has urged the French government to ease the pace of fiscal adjustment next year and find efficiency savings in order to support a recovery. The IMF sees the French economy contracting by 0.2 per cent this year before returning to 0.8 per cent growth in 2014. Unemployment is forecast to [...]
EU signs off $11bn US airline merger conditional on efforts to boost competition August 5, 2013 The EU has approved an $11bn (£7bn) merger between US Airways and AMR Corporation (including its American Airlines subsidiary) conditional on a number of key concessions. To avert a monopoly on the London-Philadelphia route, the commercial airliners would need to give up a daily slot pair at London Heathrow airport, the European Commission said today. [...]
Lib Dems propose sticking with existing university fees system and bringing back mansion tax August 5, 2013 The agenda has been released for the Lib Dem's autumn conference in Glasgow. Compared to the other party conferences it at least pretends to involve ordinary members, as loyal Lib Dems are given endless opportunities to vote on potential policies. Some conference motions are politically unrealistic pet projects of members (eg legalising cannabis) but others [...]
BP will defend against fines of £18.9m over alleged market manipulation August 5, 2013 BP has denied allegations made by US regulators of natural gas market manipulation, and has said that it will "vigorously defend against" them. US regulators – the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) and US Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) – are currently investigating several BP entitites. The FERC bases its allegations on a recorded two-minute [...]