SGM-FX insights

QT or Quantatative Tightening   This is the technical term for the Federal Reserve reducing its $9 trillion balance sheet of Treasury Bonds by allowing bonds to mature and not replacing them. That process starts today and the implications are both uncertain and will be carefully watched. The last time the world’s single largest holder […]

Battle of the Bank Holidays   With the inevitable volatility that month-end trading brings to foreign exchange markets, the distribution of bank holidays this week could hypothetically lead to a relatively illiquid environment where small headlines could create big moves. Yesterday, the US had its bank holiday to mark Memorial Day. On Thursday and Friday […]

World Wheat   Funnily enough while Ukraine’s wheat exports have fallen 32% and 20 million tonnes lie rotting in grain silos, Russian wheat exports are up 18% and the Russian Treasury has benefitted to the tune of $1.9 billion in extra wheat taxes. Russia has overtaken both Canada and the USA as the world’s largest wheat […]

China Property Market   Since property is such a key driver of the Chinese economy, the West is beginning to pay increasing attention to what has been a continually weakening market which has been beset with firstly Covid and secondly problems at one of China’s largest developers, Evergrande. To counteract this weakening, more than 100 cities […]

Battle of the Board   Two factors ignited the recent flourish in EURUSD, the world’s most liquid and typically stable currency pair. Firstly, on Tuesday, Eurozone PMIs failed to show the descent into contractionary economic territory that many feared they were capable of. Whilst the index figure that aims to measure business appetite and confidence […]

Argentina   Weary and bored of Partygate and Westminster rules for us but not them? Never fear here is another tale from the other end of the world: President Fernandez of Argentina has also been found guilty of partying during lockdown. Appropriately enough for a country that defaulted on its debt for the 9th time […]

Further Ahead   One of the best determinants of short-term currency movements comes from interest rate differentials. So-called ‘hot money’ that flows through the global economy seeking short term higher yields are often responsible for the intra-day, week and month currency fluctuations that we are all accustomed to. However, interest rate differentials often fail to […]

Japan Cherry Blossom   They take the Sakura or the cherry blossom festival seriously in Japan and records have been scrupulously maintained for the past 1200 years as to exactly the date that the blossom is declared to be in full bloom. Last year it was March 26 and this year it was April 1. […]

Australia: Insurance   A hot topic (no pun) for this weekend’s Federal Elections in Australia is of course climate change. With bushfires and floods having cost insurers dear in recent times, the projection is that by 2030 1 in 25 homes in Australia will be uninsurable. On average premiums have increased fourfold for property insurance […]

Inflation – good, bad and ugly rolled into one   As an avid reader of the market insight that we publish daily to your many multimedia devices, you will likely have recognised a shift in the way we have been talking about inflation. In days gone by, you would have seen Humphrey, me, and your […]

Auto Manufacturer Market Capitalisations   If like me you have recently enjoyed the Netflix documentary film Elon Musk-it does what it says on the tin-you may have wondered at how Tesla’s market cap compares to say 1. VW or, if one took a combination of 2. Mercedes-Benz, Ford, BMW and Honda how they in total […]

Not All That Ordinary   It’s not every day that a nation, let alone two, announces that it will be applying for NATO membership. But yesterday, when Sweden joined Finland in announcing its process towards membership of the defence body, the attention was elsewhere: Russia. Russia has seemingly struggled to make the advances it has […]