Evil discusses Ithaca Energy, Afren and Quindell… My correspondent in the matter of Ithaca (IAE) opines: ”- Ithaca’s $300m 2019 note was given a Caa1 rating by Moody’s in December (i.e. very high credit risk), and this used a base case of an initial production date for Ithaca’s Greater Stella Area in Q3 2015, which…
Although in theory it makes no difference to a technical analyst whether they call a stock or market long or short – the method is fine for both directions – I have to confess I am usually biased to the upside. This doesn’t necessarily mean that I always look on the bright side of a…
By Dave Evans of Binary.com This week there have been numerous newspaper headlines riffing on a similar theme – “Stock markets party like its 1999”. If only Prince received royalties for such headlines! FTSE 100 Monthly Chart After the bursting of the tech bubble, the financial crisis and the Euro troubles, the FTSE 100 finally…
The Markets At the London close the Dow Jones had slipped by 4.31 points to 18,220.26 and the Nasdaq was up by 16.30 points at 4,456.89. In London the FTSE 100 closed up by 14.35 points at 6,949.73 and he FTSE 250 gained 61.53 to 17,249.80, the FTSE All-Share was up by 8.25 points at…
Economic analysis by Filipe R. Costa I came across a very interesting article on WSJ describing how the franc uptrend upends life at the Swiss borderlands. Besides portraying life near the Swiss border, the dynamics of the exchange rate movement between the franc and the euro described in the article teaches us an important lesson:…
Perhaps just as interesting as the record high for the FTSE 100 is the way that over the past week or so we have seen some remarkable recoveries in stocks which have hitherto been on the back foot. Many of these are also stocks that private investors are up to the eyeballs in from higher…
By Robert Sutherland Smith The results just published for BHP Billiton (BLT) came as a bit of a surprise. They are interesting in that they demonstrate what management can do to counter poor trading conditions. Equity investment is crucially about that ability of human management to anticipate and confront challenges. Conversely, if you own a…
The Markets More trouble for the banks as it emerged that RBS has suspended a further two employees as part of its investigation into the rigging of foreign exchange markets. Last month RBS was one of six banks fined a combined 2.6 billion pounds for failing to stop traders rigging the forex markets,…
I have to admit that the occasion of the first new FTSE 100 record close in 15 years is one which is accompanied by mixed feelings. After all, bulls could argue quite successfully that the moment when 6,930 was broken after the end of 1999 could have been early in 2000, while the dotcom bubble…
By Robert Sutherland Smith The one thing that I have always liked about HSBC (HSBA) was the legacy of those old Scottish colonialists for hard headedness and Church of Scotland respectability. Tea planting and banking were two well known commercial pursuits of Scots imperialists. But here we are with HSBC caught out by the tax…
