SGM-FX insights

Turkey   Emerging Markets nervous on Turkey’s reported removal from the MSCI Emerging Market Index. Those nerves are due to the increasing difficulty of accessing the Turkish market plus the unpredictable behaviour of President Erdogan. If Turkey was removed, there would not only be a huge outflow of existing foreign investment but those future inward […]

Germany   Jenns Weidmann, President of the Bundesbank has made a call this weekend which the rest of Europe including the UK would do well to heed-if indeed as we all hope that it is correct: Germany’s economy has passed the low point of the crisis caused by the Covid outbreak. So by definition, the […]

Indian Railways   Owned by the Indian government, Indian Railways in normal times operates 20,000 trains a day, has revenues of USD 28 Billion per annum and employs 1.3 Million staff. India has committed to electrify 100% of the network by 2023 and be carbon neutral by 2030. For any of you who have travelled […]

Global Equity Markets   A strong day for all equity markets and worth noting that the S&P Futures Index is back to the level it was at at the beginning of March. So pricing reflects plenty of optimism that the worst is behind us and buoyed on a wave of even cheaper funding, equity markets […]

Singapore and I.T.   Population 5.6 million: Covid19 cases 28,000 or 0.5%. Deaths 22-a shining example of a successful virus fighting strategy. However the new Singapore contact and trace App with only a take up by 25% of the population has got off to a shaky start: 357 people were texted informing them they had […]

Earth Day   Today is Earth Day when the world joins together to demonstrate support for environmental protection. The first earth day was in 1970 and involved 20 million Americans enjoying some spring sunshine that year. It now involves 192 countries and is the “largest secular holiday” in the world. That means that it is […]

Hin Leong Trading Pte, Singapore   This oil trader has notched up losses of a magnitude which are still unclear despite having declared profits of SGD 78.3M which is just over USD50M up until October 2019. Founder and Director O.K. Lim “instructed the company”-no not sure how that works either- to suppress the trading losses […]

Turkish Lira   Exactly one year ago USD versus Turkish Lira (TRY) was 5.79 and today it is 6.90, a depreciation of over 19%. Looking at forward pricing and listening to market chat, the expectation is that the Turkish Central Bank will shortly have to concede and let the TRY find a new lower level. […]

Unintended Consequence?   Off-shoring has been  the name of the game for Western companies seeking opportunities to shave costs by relocating jobs that could be shifted and filled by the large and less expensive workforce available in India, Sri Lanka and other Asian countries. Insurance call centres, banking payment centres, IT coding and many other […]

Emerging Nightmare   The currencies of those nations earlier in their cycle of economic development are always the most vulnerable during a crisis. With thinner capital markets, a reliance upon the exportation of primary or secondary materials and raw commodities, they are highly sensitive to global downturn. Accordingly, their currencies are always the first to […]

OPEC+   Yesterday evening in a high stakes negotiation ahead of the markets opening in Asia, the protagonists met to try and agree the largest cut in production ever-10%. The issue apart from the tumbling price of oil now at $22.76 in NYC on Thursday evening is as highlighted here previously storage: quite simply capacity has been […]

South Korea   Known sometimes as “Delivery nation” and its citizens as “Delivery minjok” which means delivery race, even before Covid-19, the expectation is for everything to be available for delivery and often within hours. The delivery staff are often worked as hard if not harder than Amazon fulfilment centre workers- the difference being that […]