Daily Brief – Mariannes

Mariannes

In addition to gold coins such as South African Krugerrands, Canadian Maple Leafs, and American Gold Eagles, from June 16 you will once again be able to buy French Mariannes. The last time France minted gold coins was mostly in the Napoleonic era and appropriately they were called Napoleons and were issued between 1803 and 1914. Mariannes will be issued in a range of sizes from 0.1 oz or 3.1 gm size up to 1 oz or 31.1 gm. Some collectors may also possess the predecessor to the French Napoleon which was named the Louis and was first issued in 1640.

Gold USD 4,532.60.

Calm Waters

This is the term used by Greek and Turkish diplomats to describe the present entente between the two countries that have all too often in the past escalated to what those same diplomats called confrontation. These past few days in Nicosia, Cyprus, it was noticeable how many more Turkish number plates one saw and how very many more Turkish tourists were in evidence. Historically, Greeks travelled to Turkey where they found cheaper prices on goods and especially petrol, but this situation has reversed. Five years ago, approximately 500,000 Greeks visited Turkey annually and the same number of Turks travelled to Greece. That number has remained constant for Greeks but the number of Turks visiting Greece has tripled to reach more than 1.5 million in 2025.

EUR/USD 1.1624.

Maltesers

We just need to dispel one myth and that is that the famous chocolate confectionary item, Maltesers, have nothing to do with Malta G.C. Home of SGM-FX’s European HQ. The trade name Maltesers was the brainchild of Forrest Mars Sr of the Mars Corporation in Slough, UK in 1936 and was arrived at by combining the malted milk centre of the confection plus the word teasers. Originally described as “energy balls aimed at slimming women”, fortunately Mars realised that they were on to something with rather greater appeal which needed a catchier handle and marketed a raft of derivative Malteser products around the world from Australia to Canada under the banner of “the lighter way to enjoy chocolate.”

EUR/GBP 0.8649.

US Dollar 

Steadied and rose on the back of Mario Rubin’s comments that a peace deal would take longer. Brent oil at USD 99.51 and the USD was broadly stronger against the major currencies such as EUR, JPY, and GBP. Overall, the (current) market sense is that there is no compelling case for a weaker USD in the near future.

GBP/USD 1.3441.

Time is on My Side

The Rolling Stones scored big with their Andy Warhol designed album Sticky Fingers which featured a working jeans zip this day in 1971. But if that was not enough, this day in 2012 Mick Jagger’s holiday home in Mustique went on the market for rent at GBP 9500 per week but canny Mick insisted on vetting potential renters-presumably to ensure that they were sufficiently bad boy to keep up the Rolling Stones’ behaviour. Keith Richards the same day in turn offered his home at Parrot Key, Turks and Caicos at £35,000 per week but Keith did not stipulate that he had to check out his prospective renters.

Time is on my side, yes it is
Time is on my side, yes it is

Now you all were saying that you want to be free
But you’ll come runnin’ back (I said you would baby)
You’ll come runnin’ back (like I told you so many times before)
You’ll come runnin’ back to me, yeah

Time is on my side, yes it is
Time is on my side, yes it is

You’re searching for good times but just wait and see
You’ll come runnin’ back (I said you would darling)
You’ll come runnin back (spend the rest of life with ya baby)
You’ll come runnin’ back to me

Go ahead baby, go ahead, go ahead and light up the town
And baby, do anything your heart desires
Remember, I’ll always be around
And I know, I know like I told you so many times before
You’re gonna come back
Yeah, you’re going to come back baby
Knockin’, yeah knockin’ right on my door, yeah

Time is on my side, yes it is
Time is on my side, yes it is

Discussion and Analysis by Humphrey Percy, Chairman and Founder

Click Here to Subscribe to the SGM-FX Newsletter