United States The Republican tax reform plan unveiled on Wednesday was the biggest driver of US markets this week. The tax reform plan pledges to affect meaningfully American corporations as Trump announced to cut the corporate tax rate from 35% to 20% (though falling short from the 15% he promised Read more…
Recent drivers of the Euro/USD exchange rate Despite the divergence in monetary policies between the hawkish FED and dovish ECB, the Euro has been appreciating against the Dollar since the beginning of 2017, registering a +13.44% increase on 1st September. However, in the last two weeks it fell under pressures Read more…
Introduction The Japanese PM dissolved the lower parliament on 28th September, initiating the process for the snap elections to be held on October 22nd. We believe that it is a move to secure a fresh mandate in the parliament after Mr. Abe’s association with a series of scandals over the Read more…
United States The post-financial crisis US equity rally continues this week, with the S&P 500 closing at $2,502.22 ( +0.08% over the week). Apple’s share price slide led it to its worst week in 17 months because of the mixed reviews for its new iPhone 8, as it offers just Read more…
Industry overview One of the core Indian industries is the automotive industry. In 2016, India was the World’s 6th vehicle manufacturer with a total production of 24 million units and the 5th biggest passenger vehicle market. In the same year, this sector accounted for 7.1% of the country GDP, 27% Read more…
The aim of this article is to analyse the popular Fed Model, pointing out its strengths as a descriptive tool but warning investors against its alleged predictive qualities. The Fed Model is a stock valuation approach introduced in the late 1990s. It asserts that the acceptable earnings yield (the inverse Read more…
United States The post-financial crisis US equity rally this week overtook the 1949-56 run to become the second-strongest bull market in US history. The S&P 500 closed the week at $2,500.23, a new record high. North Korea missile tests and possible Fed balance sheet tightening were ignored by the market, Read more…
Introduction Chinese Ministry of Finance announced on June 13th that it will issue 14 billion RMB and 2 billion USD sovereign bonds this year in Hong Kong, marking the first issuance of dollar-denominated sovereign bonds after 2004. Major financial publications (including WSJ and FT) have reported this week that the Read more…
Recently the spread between oil benchmark Brent and Us counterpart West Texas Intermediate has reached the highest levels in two years, breaking above $7/bbl in September. In this article we will give a brief introduction of different crude oils, the fundamental reasons behind price differentials, and an idea on how Read more…
United States The S&P 500 closed the week at $2,399.29, a record high and up 0.63% when compared with the close of the previous week. During the week several important announcements have been released; first of all the Federal Reserve decided to leave interest rate unchanged at 0.75%-1.00% following the Read more…
Introduction This article throws light on an important decision about Euribor that came out this week on May 4th. The decision refers to the conclusion of the pre-live exercise that was carried out to determine the change in method of calculation of Euribor. We will proceed in the following way: Read more…
Introduction The purpose of this article is to apply the mathematical framework of Modern Portfolio Theory to an unconventional asset class. Cryptocurrencies, Bitcoin included, are a novel and little known asset class with a relatively low market cap of $44 billion and very high volatility. By applying Markowitz’s Portfolio Theory Read more…
United States After the French election relief and solid first quarter earnings reports the US equities finished the week higher. Slightly more than half of the S&P 500 has reported, showing positive signs of improving economic growth, with best performers tech and industrial companies. The S&P 500 after the rally Read more…
Introduction In this article, after a brief introduction to efficient market hypothesis and the very basics of technical analysis, we implement two different trading strategies based on moving averages and few oscillators on a wide set of equity indexes in various countries. The aim is to investigate whether efficient market Read more…
Introduction This article discusses the impact of Trumponomics (Trump’s economic program) on the valuation of regional and international banks’ stock prices. It starts by providing an overview of the US banking system, and then moves towards explaining Trump’s expansionary fiscal program and its implied effect on the valuation of regional Read more…