Forex

January 28 2013 7:26 PM

During the current commodity supercycle, there have been occasions—too many to count—when investor psyche has been damaged by reports about slowing U.S. growth, a hard landing in China or a debt crisis in Europe. Yet just behind the gloom, significant and positive trends are taking hold, causing the storms to start dissipating.

January 28 2013 9:50 AM

The euro seemed to be well on its way to recovery on Monday morning as it vaulted toward an 11 month high against the dollar. The common currency, buoyed by renewed investor confidence in the region, traded at 1.3435 on Monday. The currency rocketed after news on Friday confirmed predictions that eurozone banks would repay more than expected of their European Central Bank loans.

January 25 2013 2:12 PM

Are the euro's gains just starting as the ECB balance sheet shrinks further from LTRO repayment? 278 European banks have repaid €137 bn in the first LTRO operation, which raised € 489 bn in December 2012. LTRO-2 from February 2012 now receive a repayment of about €250 bn.On today's announcement, Spanish 10-year yield saw its biggest decline of all Eurozone bonds, losing 15 bps versus a mere 3 bps for its Italian counterpart. This is partly explained by the fact that Spanish banks were the biggest borrowers in LTRO-1 lending, accounting for 41% of total take-up, compared to 25% from Italian banks.

January 25 2013 9:08 AM

January 23 marked a historic event for the Federal Reserve, the monetary institution which has seen its share of historic events since the onset of the financial crisis in 2007. However, as of the week ended January 23, the Fed's balance sheet grew to $3 trillion for the first time ever, the largest in the Fed's nearly 100 year history.

January 24 2013 9:27 AM

The euro ticked up steadily on Thursday morning as Portugal took its first steps toward financial freedom on Wednesday afternoon and held a successful bond auction. Following in the footsteps of Ireland, Portugal sold longer term debt for the first time since April 2011 when it was forced into bailout.

January 23 2013 10:27 AM

Public debt levels in the euro zone neared their projected peak last year after more than a decade of huge borrowing, but data also highlighted a divide between the richer north and Mediterranean countries where the burden is still growing. Government debt stabilized at 90 percent of economic output in the 17 nations sharing the euro in the third quarter, barely changed from 89.9 percent in the second, the EU's statistics office Eurostat said on Wednesday.

January 22 2013 10:39 AM

The euro remained strong on Tuesday morning after investors sized up the newest chairman of the Eurogroup Monday afternoon. The common currency traded at 1.3362. Dutch Finance Minister Jeroen Dijsselbloem became the new chairman of the 17 eurozone finance ministers on Monday after being elected by his peers. He replaced Luxembourg's Jean-Claude Juncker as leader of the Eurogroup, allowing him powerful influence over the region's policies, as he will chair the Finance Ministers' monthly meetings for the next two and a half years.

January 18 2013 1:04 PM

The euro has shown signs of strength over the last two days, after further evidence that the eurozone could be past the worst of the crisis. The eurozone is still in recession, the GDP for the region contracted by 0.1% in the last quarter. However, there are signs that the fundamentals are in a position to support a return to growth. Reports on Tuesday showed that the trade balance for the euro-region increased from 8.2B to 11.0B and the unemployment rate as a whole remained steady.

January 17 2013 8:54 AM

While the markets are stepping cautiously towards the negations of having a deal to raise the debt ceiling in US from the current $16.4b, the worries about the deficit financing in US are rising up as with no deal there can be another financial crisis as the government which pays 2 million bills a day cannot issue new bonds and it will be forced to wait for liquidity and also cut spending by a way can cause turmoil can lead to default.