Bitcoin price flirts with $9,000 mark ahead of halving event May 5, 2020 Last week the price of Bitcoin (BTC) moved from $7,700 to hit a $9,300 high before seeing a correction to drop below $8,700. Ether (ETH), the second-largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization, moved in a similar pattern, starting the week at $195 and reaching a $226 high, before dropping back to $201. Bitcoin saw a significant [...]
TfL needs a bailout, but nobody should give the Mayor a blank cheque May 5, 2020 As Londoners start to look forward to the end of the lockdown, TfL is in need of a bailout. Otherwise, according to Sadiq Khan, it will run out of cash. On the face of it, there’s nothing remarkable about TfL needing a bailout. Tube ridership is down 94%, buses down 85%. Even if passenger numbers [...]
The oil war risks becoming a three-way suicide pact May 4, 2020 I have long been a devotee of the films of the great Sergio Leone, especially his Spaghetti Westerns. On a laughably threadbare budget, the great director made a virtue of his technical limitations, creating nothing less than a whole new look and feel in filmmaking. The climaxes of Leone films are always a treat, perhaps [...]
US Federal Reserve holds rates and expresses caution about recovery April 29, 2020 The US Federal Reserve has kept interest rates on hold at their current record low level and signalled that they will stay there until “the economy has weathered” the coronavirus outbreak. The Fed said coronavirus “is causing tremendous human and economic hardship”. It added that it “poses considerable risks to the economic outlook over the [...]
US economy shrinks at fastest pace since financial crisis April 29, 2020 The US economy shrank at its fastest rate since the financial crisis in the first three months of the year as coronavirus hammered the country, figures have shown, although analysts warned worse is yet to come. US GDP shrank at an annualised rate of 4.8 per cent in the January to March period, the Bureau [...]
There is a difference between helicopter money and quantitative easing April 28, 2020 Many investors have it wrong. This round of central bank alchemy starring Jay Powell is not Ben Bernanke the Redux… Yes, on both occasions central bankers rode in on their white horses and saved the day by slashing rates, buying fixed income securities, flattening volatility and offering bazooka style forward guidance, and for that they deserve [...]
Coronavirus: Asian markets rebound as Bank of Japan expands stimulus package April 27, 2020 Asia’s premier markets opened strongly this morning after the Bank of Japan announced it would buy an unlimited amount of government bonds in order to protect the country’s economy from the coronavirus pandemic. The Nikkei rose 2.8 per cent to 19,803.76, the Hang Seng picked up two per cent to 24,304.32 and the MSCI, which [...]
Coronavirus: The end for business travel? April 24, 2020 Nobody has missed the chaos caused in aviation by the Covid-19 crisis. One of the first industries to be hit, the global travel body IATA is forecasting a £17.3 bn revenue loss for the UK alone. With border restrictions coming into force across the world, international flights have become scarce and some business commentators argue [...]
Johanna Kyrklund: It pays to be patient April 22, 2020 As lockdown continues for millions of us across the world, unsure of when we will see loved ones or return to our places of work, we all know we must be patient. Good things come to those that wait, as they say. This seems to me to be true not only from a personal viewpoint, [...]
Cash is king…until it isn’t April 21, 2020 George Zarya is the CEO of cryptocurrency exchange BEQUANT. Founded in May 2018, BEQUANT Exchange averages over a billion dollars in monthly volume with more than 200 active institutional clients. The ongoing fight of the Covid-19 pandemic has accelerated the global trend towards cashless society. Here he argues the case that the days of cash [...]