Financial markets are still very volatile.
As you may already know ( a recap/summary),
The geopolitical situation in Middle East North Africa (MENA) is not getting much better. With France, USA, UK and allies, no fly zone was declared protecting the citizens of Libya.
As a result, mining commodities prices though volatile are trending much higher. Gold spot prices had broken lifetime high, Silver spot prices had broken year high, Crude prices broke through US$ 106 per barrel.
The (ongoing) earthquake and tsunami on March 11th resulted in a nuclear crisis amongst Japan’s nuclear plants. Though the situation had improved, the threat of radiation had not receded. As a result, global financial equity markets nose dive last week. Though volatile, the trend had much improved from bargain hunters!
Japanese Yen, USDJPY strengthen to 76.5 thereabouts before the coordinated effort of G7 weakened USDJPY to current levels of USD 80.90 thereabouts. USD is generally still very weak – my speculation is that the USD might improve late 1H into early 2H, however, pending any announcement of QE3? US interest rates expectation in Q4 2011 or Q1 2012?
PIIGS, EU sovereign debts as most of you already know had resurfaced. Focus is on Ireland and Portugal with the latter experiencing credit rating downgrades from credit watch agencies. Speculators, however brushed off the event and the Euro rose against most currencies.
0 comments:
Post a Comment