Forex Fundamental Analysis

The chairman’s comments were enough to breathe a touch of optimism into Asian markets which allowed them to close slightly higher.

Last week was yet another turbulent one for the major stock markets on the back of continuing uncertainty on sovereign debt, largely within Europe and the repercussions of the Gulf of Mexico oil pollution disaster which sent BP shares down steeply.

The finance ministers of the Group of 20 leading industrial nations (G20) will be meeting in Busan, South Korea at the weekend (tending to suggest that nobody really believes a conflagration of the relationship between the two Koreas is imminent; despite the sinking of a South Korean warship recently).

Employment always lags behind the recovery after an economic recession since companies need to have plenty of evidence of demand before they engage new staff.

The level of unemployment across the EU is quite heterogeneous with the worst level being seen in Latvia (22.5%) which is not a Eurozone country and the best being Eurozone member, the Netherlands at 4.4%

The European debt crisis seems to have become a fixture of the landscape. It could also be that it has finally been factored into the markets; to a large extent, it had been the “obvious elephant” for quite some time before the Greek situation focussed minds on it.

Friday marked the last full week’s trading session in May. The week was mixed for the major stock markets with the best performance coming from Europe.

In what is clearly a twitchy and nervous global market, stocks have been regaining some of the ground that they lost on the back of the sovereign debt crisis with its focus on the Euro.

With unilateral moves taken by Germany to ban naked short-selling and more in the pipeline

To nobody’s particular surprise, the Bank of Japan decided to hold its interest rate at 0.1% where it has stood since January 2009.

The IMF operates under the auspices of the United Nations and as such their employees are international civil servants, working for the good of all their 186 Member States.

Last week was another turbulent one for the major stock markets on the back of continuing uncertainty on sovereign debt and politicians tinkering with the markets and their rules.

The US Senate has just passed a bill said to be the most significant reform of US financial regulations since the aftermath of the Great Depression in the 1930s.

All eyes have been on the debt crisis in Greece and the possibility for Spain and Portugal to become bogged down in their own debt mires.

In an unexpected move, Germany announced a unilateral ban on naked short selling of shares in 10 German banks and insurance companies that will come into force immediately and remain in place until the end of next March.