Wednesday 30 December 2015

2015 - The biggest year ever for Hollywood


It was officially confirmed that 2015 was the biggest year ever for Hollywood.



Tuesday 29 December 2015

Oil prices remain under pressure


Oil prices remained under pressure due to the weak demand, although small increases reported on Tuesday.


Audi shrinks its spending plans for 2016



Volkswagen's flagship Audi plans to shrink significantly its speding plans for 2016 and plans to postpone the construction of a new wind tunnel, after Volkswagen concern suffered from a scandal over rigged emissions test.




Thursday 24 December 2015

Merry Christmas!


Dear friends,

Christmas usually brings family and friends together.

Christmas
helps us appreciate the love in our lives we can often take for granted.

May the true meaning of the holiday season fill your heart and home with many blessings!


May this holiday season sparkle and shine!

M
ay all of your wishes and dreams come true, and may you feel this happiness all year round.


Wish you a Merry Christmas!



Mixed trading on Wall Street today

Trading on US exchanges today showed mixed results after continuing recovery of oil prices considering that the past three days the US indices recorded gains.



Wednesday 23 December 2015

European markets ended with strong gains after rising oil prices


European markets accelerated gains before the upcoming Christmas holidays and closed with strong gains as investors welcomed the recovery of oil prices and shares of mining companies.

The pan-European STOXX 600 finished 2.7 percent higherprovisionally, with all sectors closing sharply higher, helped by a positive trading session in the U.S.




Tuesday 22 December 2015

US economy grew by 2% in the third quarter



The gross domestic product of the USA increased by 2% in the third quarter, according to the
third estimate, that was released today by BEA.
The result was below initial estimates for growth of 2.1%, but exceeded the forecasts of analysts, who expected more serious correction to 1.9
%.
The change of the data is influenced mainly by the trade deficit, which was above previous estimates and the stockpiling recorded a slight increase according to the reported earlier.
Exports increased by 0.7% instead of 0.9% while imports rose 2.3% instead of 2.1%. The increase of stockpiling was revised from $ 90.2 billion to $ 85.5 billion.
However, home construction is represented more strongly than previous calculations, with recovery of 8.2 percent instead of 7.3 percent.
The growth of domestic consumption remains at 3% and business investment recorded an increase of 2.6% for previous estimates of 2.4%.
For the first nine months of 2015, the US economy registered expansion of 2.2%, and probably continued at the same pace in the last months of the year.


Oil prices recovered in anticipation of stockpiles data in US



Friday 18 December 2015

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Thursday 17 December 2015

Markets pushed higher after Fed decision




As expected, the Fed raised interest rates for the first time in nine years by 25 basis points to a level of 0.25% - 0.50%. Fed reported that household consumption and business investment are solid, the labor market is strong and unemployment has decreased significantly over the last year.
Fed predicts interest rates of 1.4% at the end of 2016, which alludes for four increases next year. The projections for the end of 2017 are for 2.4%, which is a minimal change from one increase less than previously forecasted.
Forecasts for GDP growth, unemployment and inflation remained unchanged or minimally revised. Inflation is expected to lead to steady growth in medium term to levels of 2%.
Overall monetary policy is expected to help further economic activity.
On foreign exchange markets the dollar remained strong this morning and pushed the euro to 1.0850 and climbed to 122.40 against the yen.
Gold retained gains after the increase in interest rates by the Fed.
Silver was traded in tandem with gold after finding good support.
Platinum is found some support from signals of increasing demand from European carmakers.

Wednesday 16 December 2015

Why the US dollar will continue to rise next year


The US dollar has already marked remarkable rise against other major currencies in anticipation of the Fed's decision on interest rates. According to experts from US investment bank J.P. Morgan, however, the growth of the dollar will continue next year.

"It feels like the market is probably already paying back a little bit of its long dollar positioning… We could potentially see a little bit of a dollar pullback but probably nothing beyond 1 percent in terms of the majors," said J.P. Morgan's head of EM Asia FX strategy, Jonathan Cavenagh.



Tuesday 15 December 2015

Meet CFETS RMB Index


Last Friday China unveiled  a new index of the currency in an attempt to draw the attention of market participants away from the fluctuations of the yuan against the dollar.
People’s Bank of China said that the stability of the yuan should not be measured in terms of the dollar alone. Therefore index CFETS RMB will measure the strength of the Chinese currency against a basket of trading partner’s currencies. It was introduced by Chinese forex trading system (China Foreign Exchange Trade System), an arm of the PBOC that facilitates interbank trading.

Here's what, according to Bloomberg, market needs to know about the new index:



Monday 14 December 2015

Main indices fell after oil price tumbled

European stocks plunged on Friday after the ongoing decline in oil prices has influenced the direction of major indices and they recorded the biggest weekly loss since August.
Stoxx Europe 600 fell by 2%, reaching 355.79 and thus registered a fourth consecutive losing session. Closing levels were the lowest since October until now. The overall decline of the indicator for the week was 4 percent and the weekly loss was second in a row.
The bad performance of the index this week was mainly due to the energy sector. Shares of oil and gas companies performed worst on Friday.
US crude oil was traded around seven years bottom after OPEC decided to supply a large quantity of oil, although the demand progressively decreases.
The consumer price index in Germany increased by 0.1% in November, but still remains below expectations of the ECB on inflation. Results can be justified mainly by the crisis in the energy sector.
The main US indices retreated on Friday after a fall in oil prices caused serious turmoil on Wall Street.  S&P 500 recorded its sharpest weekly decline since August, when shares fell on fears of economic retardation of China.
The hot atmosphere of the markets came shortly before the Fed to decide whether to raise interest rates for the first time in nearly a decade.
The data on US retail sales was slightly more encouraging in November, according to the Ministry of Commerce, announced Friday. It showed that the economy will continue to improve at a moderate pace over the next few months.
The index of producer prices in the US increased by 0.3% in November, but commodity prices excluding food and energy, rose only 0.1 percent.
The submitted economic data has almost no effect on Fed's decision to increase interest rates again in December or to postpone the move.

Friday 11 December 2015

USD/CNY hit a four years low


The Chinese yuan fell on Friday to over a 4-year low against the US dollar amid increasingly lower rate set by the central bank, the country's economic slowdown and the strong capital outflow.
The pair USD/CNY is trading at 6.4553 and this is the lowest level from August 2011 onwards.

 Just to remind that the gross domestic product of China slowed to 6.9 percent in the third quarter of 2015, not being able to meet the target of 7 percent, fueling fears that the country's economy will fail to grow at the desired pace after years of explosive expansion.

Thursday 10 December 2015

Australia’s unemployment fell to lowest level in 20 months


Australia’s un
employment rate fell to 20-month low in November, following the strongest two-month period of job growth in 28 years.
Unemployment dropped to 5.8%, while analysts forecasted a rise of 5.9% to 6%.
According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, the total number of people with new jobs increased to 71 4000 in November and another 56 000 in October. Full-time employment is increased to 41 600, while the number of part-time jobs is up by 29 7000.




Europe, USA and Asia stocks end mixed


Stock markets in Europe, USA and Asia closed mixed yesterday’s session.

The European Stoxx Europe 600 index declined by 0.54%. The German DAX index marked a decrease of 0.51%. The French CAC40 index fell by 0.56%. The Italian MIB stock index dropped by 0.23%. British FTSE100 index decreased by 0.17%.

US Dow Jones Industrial Average recorded an increase of 66 points (0.38 percent) to 17,634 points, S & P 500 rose 3.5 points (0.16 percent) to 2067 points in the morning session. Nasdaq recorded a decline of 14 points (0.27 percent) to 5084 points.

Shanghai Composite rose 0.65%, while Shenzhen Composite recorded a growth of 0.3%.
Japan's Nikkei 225 index fell by 0.98% despite good data on machinery orders in October and revised upwards GDP growth for the third quarter.
South Korea's Kospi index remained almost unchanged, closing the session with a 0.04% increase. The Australian index S&P ASX 200 closed with 0.55% downwards. 

Wednesday 9 December 2015

China's economy will be the biggest loser by the strong dollar


The strong dollar will inevitably have a negative effect for some countries. The biggest loser, however, will not be American but Chinese economy. The main reason for this is that the yuan was bounded to the US currency to improve their financial stability.
So when the dollar grows versus other currencies, expectations are for a recent increase in interest rates in the United States. The increase, however, applies to the Chinese currency. The problem for Beijing is that the suffering from slowdown second largest economy in the world is twice more dependent on trade than the US.

“It’s a problem,” said Yukon Huang, a senior associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington and a former World Bank country director for China. “Excessive appreciation at a time when the economy is sinking is a bad thing.”

Tuesday 8 December 2015

The Force awakens for Disney


Cinema’s brand №1 returns. The force will awaken with the seventh episode of Star Wars. The premierе is on December 18, 2015 and beside cash records that will probably come after so many years of waiting, the industry has turned the popular brand in profit machine. The Walt Disney Company (DIS: XNYS) is only one of the companies that are on the crest of a wave and will benefit from the new project.
Online sales of toys in the United States reached a 12-month high of 17.7 mln US dollars in September, which is 7 times more than in September 2014. Hasbro (HAS: XNAS) has exclusive rights for the sale of toys by paying 225 mln US dollars for licenses to Disney.

What we know so far


Disney’s shares

The previous episode of Star Wars - Episode III: Revenge of the Sith - had a budget of 115 mln US dollars. It brought revenues of nearly 849 mln US dollars. And this does not include revenues from the sales of DVD, computer games, toys, etc. The overall amount of incomes is about 33 billion US dollars. At the end of October 2012 Lukasfilm was acquired by Disney for 4 billion US dollars. Then the rumours about the new three films started.

Since the beginning of 2015 Disney's shares are up by 23%, presenting much better than S&P 500, which recorded only 2% growth for the same period.

Disney's share price 2013-2015. Source: Bloomberg

This increase is not accidental. Company’s earnings increased by 32% for the third quarter on an annual basis, which significantly exceeds the average for S&P 500. And earnings per share is up by 36%. So the trend of strong growth from the last two years retains.


And this is expected to continue. But let’s see what exactly will bring the saga!

Friday 4 December 2015

Crude oil rises while US dollar is close to one-month low


Crude oil prices are growing today as OPEC ministers met in Vienna, while US dollar is close to  
one-month lows a day after staging its largest one-day fall in nearly seven years.