Wednesday 29 February 2012

Not only western countries show “negative” figures. But the market seems calmed, and the expectation of a new injection of funds from the ECB is about to boost investors’ appetite.

Negative GDP figures are not only an issue of today’s west economies. In the last quarter 2011, India’s economic GDP growth showed a slow growth, compared to the weakest one registered three years ago. The difference with developed countries is that, this growth, for the period October-December, rose up to 6.1 percent..... Read More





Tuesday 28 February 2012

HSBC comes to the rescue with positive news from the annual statements; the sterling instead, seems to show investor’s cautiousness about UK’s economy.


HSBC, the Biggest bank in the UK, and in Europe, presented its results for the year 2011. The bank, different from Lloyds and RBS, had in the last year positive figures, showing profits for £13.8 bn, a growth of around 15 percent respect to 2010.
Despite this, analyst were stipulating pre-tax profits bigger than the real ones, reported in £14.1 bn, which is not bad at all, especially if compared to the other banks mentioned above,...Read More


Monday 27 February 2012

There comes a new Sun every Sunday, but the sun these days does not always shine to the economy and financial markets.

After the decline and consequently, polemic closure of News of the World in July, Rupert Murdoch hits again the tabloids on Sunday with Sun on Sunday. The first emend is to achieve high ethical standards, and the first edition proves to follow this path, especially after the scandals of the last paper, in which 10 journalists got arrested for several charges of corruption.
With an editorial titled “A new Sun rises today”, the sun, that will be seen every seven days, is filled with celebrity news, show business and new columnists, the paper will focus on convincing people of the rules of conduct they follow, in order for the readers to begin again to trust. ....Read More



Sunday 26 February 2012

After RBS, comes Lloyds with negative results, in a week with changes in the monetary policy



At the end of this week, Lloyds Banking Group reported a loss of £3.5 bn for the period of 2011. This negative figure, obtained before tax, makes a contrast of the results obtained in 2010, when the bank had a profit of £281m.
The bank, which is 41 percent tax-payer owned, declared also, through Antionio Horta-Osorio, the Chief Executive, that 2012 will be a tougher year than the previous one.....Read More






Friday 24 February 2012

UK’s Economy contracted 0.2% in the fourth quarter 2011 – Guilty: Business Investment


The Office for National Statistics announced its review of the UK’s Economy for the end of 2011, revising it down to 0.7 percent with a previous estimation of 0.8 percent. Nevertheless, with the whole 2011 revision, the UK GDP shrank by 1 percent, going from 0.9 percent to the actual 0.8 percent.
Despite the fact that expenses from the side of consumers grew 0.5 percent, this increase did not help significantly to the overall economy....Read More



Thursday 23 February 2012

RBS announces £2bn Losses- More than Last year but far away from 2008


RBS, the Royal Bank of Scotland, announced the financial results of 2011, reporting a £2bn losses. After the negative news, the Bank also made a confirmation of the payment of £390 m in bonuses, to the 17,000 investment bankers, completing a total of £785m in total bonuses payments, to all of RBS’s employees. Despite this, the total outflow in bonuses has decreased respect to 2010, in 43%, mainly due to this situation, and for RBS’s investment bank, it is a reduction of about 60%, when last year the bank gave £950m.....Read More

Wednesday 22 February 2012

Bank of England: Divided decisions to stimulate UK’s Economy, helping Pounds fall
The policymakers that belong to the bank of England were analyzing this month the possibility to inject another stimulus to the British economy. In this discussion, David Miles and Adam Posen decided to a bigger quantity, of £75 bn boost, in order to increase the money supply and keep the rates under control. The rest of the MPC, nonetheless, voted for a minor stimulus, of £50 bn, that, according to them, is sufficient enough to keep the inflation objective of 2 percent according to their forecasts, and that a bigger number would maybe send a mixed signal to the market:.....Read More

Tuesday 21 February 2012


Markets in Europe began to recover confidence, even if Greece will struggle to reach the objectives and keep pulling down the European Economy



The GDP Growth of the biggest economies (the OECD Economies) fell only 0.1 percent in the last quarter of 2011, according to the OECD. Even if it is a provisional data, it is still a significant sign that the countries were not so attacked by the perception of a new credit crunch in the Euro Zone. With negative numbers in important countries such as Italy (-0.7 percent) and Japan (-0.6 percent), UK and Germany both felt a decline of 0.2 percent, even if the latter ones helped in the overall 2011 positive performance. With this, the main factor behind the scenes continues to be Greece, which according to the IMF, the ECB and the European Commission of Greece’s debt, the country will find really steep the mountain to reach the target of 120 percent of its debt to GDP by 2020, needing among other things......Read More


Monday 20 February 2012

Greece is expecting today the decision for the bailout and S&P has begun to analyze Japan’s situation.
Today is expected to be taken the final decision concerning Greece’s second bailout, on a day where the finance ministers that belong to the Euro Zone approve it and give a strong signal to the markets in the counter attack of Europe’s debt crisis. In this event will also be present the Prime Minister of Greece, Lucas Papademos, who practically took a last minute flight in order to secure the complete rescue package, where Germany is still analyzing the conditions to obtain it....Read More


Tuesday 14 February 2012

Moody’s assessed a negative outlook today after cutting, as they anticipated, the ratings for Spain, Portugal and Italy, to A1, Ba2, and A2, respectively, with also, a negative outlook. Other countries were also downgraded, and this continuous menace has impacted UK, issuing a warning to the financial market of this country. The uncertainty regarding the fiscal consolidation, and the macro economical conjuncture of the Euro area, were the triggers to this action.

The exchange rate GBP/USD changed to 1, 5686. On the other hand, EUR/ USD fell quickly to 1, 3128, and the AUD/USD is in the level of 1, 0664. These are the events that were influenced by the previous news about the new position of the rating agency Moody’s. This will have also some effect into the investors’ minds, continuing to lower their expectations in the European market, and watching UK being under observation, decreases their confidence, and subsequently, their willingness to put or leave their money in these markets.......Read More