Russia has learned to survive Western sanctions and managed to accumulate enough funds to keep its economy afloat for several years even if oil prices continue to decline. In a recent report, rating agency Moody’s said the Russian economy is less vulnerable to oil market shocks triggered by the coronavirus outbreak and the row between Moscow and Riyadh. “Russia is best-prepared of all the oil-producing countries, […]
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As the deadly infection spreads across the US, the demand for gold, the all-time safe-haven metal, has skyrocketed, but there is not enough of it in local coffers to satisfy buyers’ appetites, according to The Wall Street Journal. While dealers are reportedly out of the coveted commodity, and some were even forced to shut down. Swiss bank Credit Suisse, which has been minting gold bullions since […]
While its public budget suffers a growing deficit due to the tumbling oil prices and the spread of the novel coronavirus, the Saudi Ministry of Finance revealed that the kingdom has sold local bonds (Islamic debt bonds) worth 15.568 billion Saudi riyals ($4.15 billion) in March. In the details reported by the Saudi Press Agency (SPA), the Ministry of Finance announced that it had finished receiving […]
There is a reason why the Fed took the unprecedented step to announce it would begin buying corporate bonds this week: according to Bank of America, which is looking at the latest EPFR fund flow data, March 20 was the “bond capitulation day” when a record $34.6BN in redemption from bond funds took place. This, together with the record outflows observed in the past two weeks […]
Bitwise has revealed a plan to soon let retail investors trade its large-cap index product. The asset manager told CoinDesk Friday that it’s working to list shares of its Bitwise 10 Index Fund on OTCQX, an alternative trading system regulated by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). If approved, retail investors and advisors would be able to trade the fund on popular platforms including Charles […]
Authored by Bill Blain via MorningPorridge.com, Good Or Bad News? “It’s got nothing to do with your Vorsprung Durch technique, you know..” What do you want to hear first? The good new or the bad news? The Good News It now looks like the economic catastrophe the Virus has triggered could be shorter than we envisaged. One of things I’ve come to understand though what we […]
One would think that on the day the US reported 3.3 million (!) initial jobless claims, more than 5 times the weekly peak hit during the financial crisis, and a 30-sigma event… weekly jobless claims, a 30σ event pic.twitter.com/LEO7s5TXsH — 📈 𝙻𝚎𝚗 𝙺𝚒𝚎𝚏𝚎𝚛 📊 (@lenkiefer) March 26, 2020 … one which presages not a recession but an economic depression, stocks would be lower. One would be […]
How do you make sure that an extremely illiquid market trades like a penny stock? By accumulating enough shares to build up a market on close imbalance of over $7 billion, and wait for the exchange to disclose what the MOC was. Here is a chart of what happened at precisely 3:50pm when we learned that there was a $7 billion market on close imbalance, most […]
Jeff Bezos and other corporate executives across the country sold approximately $9.2 billion in shares of their own companies between early February and the end of last week, salvaging potential losses of up to $1.9 billion, according to an analysis of more than 4,000 regulatory filings by the Wall Street Journal. The largest seller was the richest man in the world – Jeff Bezos, who sold […]
With stocks soaring and even the VIX sliding today, there is one asset class that refuses to confirm the 3rd consecutive day of investor euphoria: no, not bonds which are being bought aggressively again (today’s 7Y auction was spectacular), although that is likely more a function of risky parity funds releveraging in a slightly more normal market where liquidity appears to be coming back. We are […]
On Tuesday, just as stocks posted what was the biggest dead-cat bounce (and short squeeze) since 1933, we cautioned bears that another “$850 Billion In Stock Buying Is About To Be Unleashed” when brought attention to the month- and quarter-end rebalancing, when some $850 billion in mandated stock buying would take place. Specifically, according to JPMorgan estimates, balanced or 60:40 mutual funds, a $1.5tr universe in […]
Spain extended its coronavirus lockdown on Thursday to at least April 12. Europe’s second-worst hit country has fought “a real war” procuring medical supplies in an overheated Chinese market that officials said was rife with fraud and speculative deals. The death toll rose by 655 overnight to 4,089. That was down from 738 deaths the previous day when Spain overtook China by the total number of […]
Just last Friday we reported that the number of distressed debt in the US – roughly defined as bonds with a spread of over 10% – had soared, doubling in just two weeks to a remarkable $500 billion. Well, double it again. According to Bloomberg’s James Crombie, there is now about $1 trillion of debt trading at distressed levels after this month’s credit rout, “and it’s […]
A small black market in the Egyptian pound has re-emerged in the last few days as the coronavirus takes its toll on the country’s main sources of foreign currency March 25, 2020 at 5:43 pm WATCH: ‘Qatar created coronavirus’ says online disinformation campaign Related Source
Even as markets were shaken by the rapid spread of the novel coronavirus, exchange and payment provider Crypto.com says interest in cryptocurrencies reached an all-time high. CEO and co-founder Kris Marszalek told CoinDesk that transaction volumes on Crypto.com more than doubled between December and February, with app downloads also hitting all-time highs. “We saw a million users on our platform last September, and we continue to […]
Over the past decade, one of the most fascinating observations in the world of precious metals has been the bizarre decoupling in the supply/demand dynamics and thus pricing, between paper and physical gold. And, as we detailed yesterday, that decoupling has become extreme. A surge in demand for physical gold – that results in precious metal vendors and exchanges becoming sold out in very short notices […]
Russia is less vulnerable to external shocks linked to turbulence in energy markets than many other oil-exporting nations, according to rating agency Moody’s. The dramatic plunge in oil prices could cut fiscal revenue and exports by more than ten percent of GDP for most exposed oil-exporting sovereigns and could eventually weaken their credit profiles, Moody’s analysts warned in a recent report. However, the impact would differ […]
Last night, when observing the unprecedented “gold run” on precious metals dealers which has left all gold vendors with little to no physical gold, we said that “the price of physical gold has decoupled from paper gold” as a result of paper gold liquidations as leveraged funds scramble to cover margin calls using safe assets… … resulting in an arbitrage that physical gold buyers, i.e., those […]
Authored by Lance Roberts via RealInvestmentAdvice.com, Let’s flashback to a time not so long ago, May 2019. “It was interesting to see Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell, during an address to the Fernandina Beach banking conference, channel Ben Bernanke during his speech on corporate ‘sub-prime’ debt (aka leveraged loans.) ‘Many commentators have observed with a sense of déjà vu the buildup of risky business debt over the past […]
The Egyptian authorities have evacuated the largest commercial market in Cairo in its efforts to curb the coronavirus outbreak. Brigadier General Majed Ahmed told journalists that the security forces have evacuated around 40,000 people from the Ataba market in Al-Moski neighbourhood following the government’s decision to ban public gatherings, including in the markets and on the streets. Ahmed added that the market area is overcrowded and […]
US President Donald Trump has appointed a special energy envoy to Saudi Arabia, as the global oil industry confronts what analysts say is the worst crisis for the industry in a hundred years. Victoria Coates is one of Trump’s longest-serving security aides, who moved from the White House in February to become a senior adviser to Energy Secretary Dan Brouillette. Coates will be given the mammoth […]
Authored by Daniel Nevins via NevinsResearch.com, With hoops “out” and exponentials “in” (referring to March Madness, the 2020 pandemic definition), there’s a new, customary disclaimer on economics and financial sites. Mine says that I, too, knew nothing about infectious disease modeling only two months ago. But I’m catching up, just like everyone else. By now, I might have reached a “Dummies Guide” standard, and I’ll keep […]
Noelle Acheson is a veteran of company analysis and CoinDesk’s director of research. The opinions expressed in this article are the author’s own. The following article originally appeared in Institutional Crypto by CoinDesk, a weekly newsletter focused on institutional investment in crypto assets. Sign up for free here. After the market storms of the past couple of weeks, we could all use some (relatively) good news. And it’s […]
The Australian share market fell sharply during its opening session of trading on Monday (AEST) after the country’s Prime Minister announced drastic measures to curb the spread of coronavirus (COVID-19). Reeling from its worst week since the global financial crisis in 2008-2009, the benchmark S&P/ASX200 has fallen from Friday’s close of 4,816 basis points to around 4,536, after Prime Minister Scott Morrison declared historic measures to […]