I. OPEC and price trends Oil prices have been declining since last summer on concerns about production outpacing demand: the Brent slid by almost 30% from $115 in mid-June to the recent low of $76. Will prices carry on falling? Or have we hit the bottom? Next Thursday’s OPEC meeting will Read more…
On normal market days, the (positive) correlation between gold and silver is quite high. Looking at the chart below, it looks like silver gives chase to the movements in gold and follows them quite closely. One thing we can observe though is that downside changes in gold reflect more heavily Read more…
Oil has been completely crushed after peaking this summer: much has changed since our last article earlier this year (https://bsic.it/oil-quo-vadis/). Weakness in the price of crude was triggered by fear of a global slowdown: China growing at its lowest rate since 2009 (only 7.3%), together with cuts in economic forecast Read more…
Italy represents the third largest market for energy service in Europe. A brief background catch up of the Italian market should be given: Italy’s main energy supplier is ENEL S.p.A, holding a 45% market share; that is to say, the remaining side of the supply is left for all the Read more…
History is full of surprises, even regarding financial history. For example do you know that the only futures contracts you cannot trade are the ones on onions? This is not a joke but a serious piece of law, the Onion Futures Act passed on august 1958. Indeed in 1955, two Read more…
Panel 22|11|2013 US This week Bernanke surprised the markets outlining the chance of early tapering of QE (December meeting). For us this is quite surprising, as we still believe the US economy is not performing as well as it was believed this spring. Three main reasons have worsened our outlook Read more…
Not so long ago, prices of oil, steel and gold (just to name a few) were thought to continue floating upwards forever as China entered its third decade of growing with breakneck speed. However, commodity prices have been deteriorating since 2008-2009, in line with sluggish growth and fall in demand Read more…