SGM-FX insights

Super Mario   Finally running out of Mushrooms, Super Mario has delivered his last speech as President of the European Central Bank. I’m sure there were other jokes afforded by the potential to assimilate the Italian central banker’s name within a popular Nintendo character and game but, with an underwhelming appetite for video games, I’ll […]

  South Africa: ZAR expected to weaken further   Patience within the business community is wearing thin in the face of the slow pace of relatively new President Cyril Ramaphosa’s economic reforms. This seems hard since he inherited a long list of problems but that’s the thing about markets: they are hard. Wednesday this week […]

Joker   Well the joke (if that is what it was) was definitely on me: off we went to the local Cineworld for the must see Todd Phillips movie Joker starring Joaquin Phoenix and Robert de Niro. Drawn in by the film taking $96M on its opening weekend and more than $250M to date and […]

Gale force 12   Phraseology meets foreign exchange part two – ‘any port in a storm’. This time I’m on side, I would indeed rather be in any port in a storm than, as the phrase assumes, out at sea staring down a Beaufort scale-rattling wind. But, once again, it’s got limitations largely created by […]

Well that’s all right then!   My sincere thanks to European leaders for appointing me as President of the European Central Bank from 1 November 2019. It is an honour to succeed Mario Draghi. I am looking forward to working with the ECB’s talented staff to keep euro area prices stable and banks safe.   […]

GBPZAR   Remember that old teaching: you can achieve similar things by smacking something very hard with a small hammer or by tapping something softly with a sledgehammer? I must confess I’ve never found great use or utility in this phrase partially because of my underwhelming expertise in DIY and secondly, it totally ignores the […]

If Only   This weekend could have delivered a Brexit victory for the UK Government of the decisive nature of the England Lions’ victory over the Wallabies. It was not to be. After 5 1/2 hours of debate, there was a palpable sense of disappointment from all in Westminster that the Letwin Amendment had managed […]

UK Brexit   Market news was dominated yesterday by the announcement of a deal between Europe and the UK. Still doubt on whether the UK Parliament will ratify it, but for those European couch potatoes among you with nothing better to do tomorrow, Saturday, you can watch the UK Parliament on live TV from 1030 […]

Pony up   It might be sceptical to assume that the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) that has held two consecutive Conservative governments at knife point are looking for a bribe to pass a deal… but it would also be largely correct. Throughout the Brexit process the European Union has been perceived as the enemy of […]

UK plc   Yesterday was a challenge for all market commentators who had had an easy summer being negative about all things UK EU: good news of a likely breakthrough in negotiations.  However not all was lost: the UK employment figures were released and showed a fall of 56K in employment versus an expected fall […]

A Few Bad Men   “You can’t handle the truth!” A great film and, at least as far as its most famous line, somewhat representative of the Pound Sterling’s fortune. GBP has staged an immense rally as position adjustment forces those betting on the Pound’s decline to re-evaluate and trim their positions. Billions of Pounds […]

Markets   Optimism was the name of the game on Friday: China-USA Trade and anticipation of a meeting between the two Presidents in Chile next month. Then the identification of a U.K. and Europe pathway towards a Brexit deal. The Hang Seng soared then later in the day the Dow followed suit. GBP rose 4 […]