Monday morning markets are usually quiet but this morning they have all been very jittery following last week’s sell off as the FTSE 100 & NASDAQ ended October almost 2% down in October.  This weekend’s news that another US Bank (CIT) has filed for Chapter 11 in a high stakes plan to stay open while [...]

There are two major pieces of fundamental news on the economic calendar for today in the US, first this afternoon we have the CPI figures, followed in the evening with the FOMC statement and rate announcement.
Although headline US inflation continued to decline in January – easing from -0.1% in December to -0.2% – the consensus [...]

This morning on the economic calendar we have the unemployment rate in the UK, due for release at 9.30 am, with the shakeout in the labour market continuing apace, with the claimant count climbing a further 63,800 in January, whilst the more reliable LFS measure jumped 146,000 in the final three months of last year. [...]

UK fundamental news today on the economic calendar concerns the MPC minutes, released at 9.30 UK time. At its meeting earlier in the month, not only did the MPC slice a further 50 basis points off the Bank Rate paid on commercial banks’ reserves (taking it to yet another record
low of 0.50%), but it also [...]

The big news today on the economic calendar for this evening, following on from the CPI data released earlier today. Having already cut the target for the federal funds rate to a range of zero to 0.25%, there was no surprise at its end of January meeting that the Fed nominally maintained its policy stance. [...]

On the economic calendar this afternoon we have the Housing Starts in the US. The good news was that the previously reported falls in privately owned housing starts of 15.5% in December and 15.1% in November were revised down to 14.5% and 14.6% respectively. The bad news was that housing starts plummeted a further 16.8% [...]

The fundamental news for binary betting trades on Monday is centered around the US with the Industrial Production figures due for release in the afternoon ( UK time). The sharp decline in industrial sector activity observed during the final quarter of 2008, continued into the first quarter of 2009. In line with market expectation, overall [...]

Binary betting opportunities yesterday were all about the non dollar and yen currencies as currency markets reversed direction lead by equity markets, as the markets welcomed the news of a possible bailout for Greece, reversing losses of the last few days. The euro in particular surged higher with its strongest rally in 2010 to date, [...]

A quiet day on the Forex markets today for binary betting, with only two major items of news due for release today, namely the Swiss retail sales figures forecast at 1.3%, well up from last time at 0.6%, followed later in the day by the Canadian Housing Starts, which once again should be positive, with [...]

This afternoon’s higher than expected US Unemployment numbers which came in at 480,000 against a forecast f 461,000, have triggered further selling in both the global equity and forex markets, with commodities also suffering as a result.  In late afternoon trading both gold price and crude oil were sharply lower, breaching various key technical levels [...]

A relatively quiet start to trading this morning for binary betting ahead of today’s busy economic calendar, and in the forex markets there is a sustained and clear move away from the high yielding currencies of New Zealand and Australia. In early trading today the New Zealand Dollar vs US dollar pair is down by [...]

The US stock markets closed last week with a heavy bout of selling with the most significant falls occurring on the Nasdaq 100, with some of the largest blue chip stocks such as Google, Apple and Microsoft being the biggest losers on the day. Apple stocks were under pressure all day following a less than [...]

Including today, there are just two trading sessions to go before Christmas. Historically this period has been extremely positive for stock markets. Taking last night’s close as our entry point, the benchmark US index, the S&P 500 has closed higher at some point during the next 5 trading days 95.5% of the time! It will [...]

With little fundamental news for the euro dollar the forex markets are concentrating on the Japanese Yen which has seen huge moves over the last 3 trading day.  The Yen has recovered Friday’s losses against the euro and sterling and is making a good fist of doing the same against the US dollar.  The EURJPY [...]

With gold (where you can read my daily technical & fundamental analysis) stealing all the headlines as it surges ever higher reaching $1226 in early trading on the currency markets the BOJ’s bid to weaken the Yen appears to be working.  The Yen has been on the back foot these past few days and looks [...]

As traders and investors appear to shake off the Dubai debt crisis the US dollar has, once again, come under pressure resulting in the Dow climbing back over the 10,500 price handle for the first time since October.  This renewed optimism has also translated into higher commodities with the price of gold leading the way [...]

How to benefit from the current gold rally?
The market today is dominated by the rally in gold prices.  The precious metal has already hit an all time record high of $1167 per ounce in this morning’s trading having opened gapped up and a combination of chronic dollar weakness & investor fear is helping to drive [...]

Federal Reserve Chairman, Ben Bernanke, testified to the Senate committee this afternoon, laying out the FED’s view of the current economic climate globally. The meeting takes place in two parts with a pre-prepared speech first, followed by a question and answer after, and it during the latter session that we often see volatility in the [...]