Opinion – Thursday 6 August 2015

They say you’re only as good as your last trade. That may be so, but the last (and some would say only) good trade from 1980s Anglo-American pop band Katrina and the Waves – Walking on Sunshine – is 30 years old this year and the rights to the song were...

Opinion – Wednesday 5 August 2015

Much of yesterday and the past 24 hours were characterised by relatively quiet moves, with bursts of activity. Events have caused localised sharp moves in markets, but the broader drift has been consistent with a move towards pricing for a Fed hike: slightly lower...

Opinion – Tuesday 4 August 2015

Last Friday was one of the most volatile trading sessions of the previous two weeks with most of Friday’s market price action emanated from the US Q2 Employment Cost Index, which at just +0.2% Q/Q (not annualised) was the lowest Quarterly change since records began in...

Opinion – Friday 31 July 2015

It appears markets have run out of oomph. We have gone back to typical summer markets, where there is a drifting of trends but not a lot to get your teeth into. Equities were generally up to flat; but China was lower. Bond Yields drifted a little lower, as did...

Opinion – Thursday 30 July 2015

Two words, both beginning with ‘so’ – solid and some – marked the FOMC statement out as very subtly more hawkish than its recent predecessors. It leaves the US Dollar slightly higher; US Bond Yields little changed after an initial dip down; and equities...

Opinion – Wednesday 29 July 2015

Sitting, waiting for the Fed, in summer markets. That pretty much characterises the last day, which was surprising after the angst of the prior period. The concerns over China were eased (somewhat, for now) and elsewhere markets were content to reverse some of earlier...