Good morning from Frankfurt. The City of Banks. Looking forward to nudging this old-fashioned city towards some much needed modern innovations.
Once again war is at the top of the global focus. President Donald J Trump is now preparing some sort of strike against Syria in response to their alleged blatant use of chemical warfare.
The civil war that has been ravaging the country and the world for the better part of the last decade is largely seen as a proxy war between larger players.
Trump's new sanctions against Russia were hard-hitting with the Ruble getting smacked and the commodity conglomerate Glencore (LON:GLEN) caught up in the middle. Even crude oil has spiked to a multi-year high.
The abrupt shift in US-Russia relations, the prospect of renewed sanctions on Iran, and a new US National Security Advisor who favors military action is certainly weighing on asset prices today.
Today's Highlights
Tightening the Belt
Australia Goes full Crypto
The Golem is Alive
Please note: All data, figures & graphs are valid as of April 12th. All trading carries risk. Only risk capital you can afford to lose.
Traditional Markets
In early February the stock markets saw a historic sell off. The Dow Jones for the first time lost more than 1000 points in a single day, and then it did it again.
Back then, there was little to no talk about any trade war with China and certainly no concerns about big data. The narrative of that sell-off was about incoming inflation and how the Fed may react.
The Fed chair Jerome Powell was largely able to allay those fears during their March meeting by maintaining that any tightening will be gradual. However, the minutes of that meeting released yesterday tell a different story.
The market reaction to this does seem to have been muted.... so far. Perhaps drowned out by the geopolitical news. My assumption is that it will be a topic that comes up in portfolio manager meetings today.
Hooray Australia
Huge kudos to the home of the Kangaroos for following in the footsteps of Japan and South Korea by introducing new crypto-friendly regulations in the country.
Crypto exchanges are not only legal now but will be subject to the regulations of AUSTRAC, the Australian Transactions Reports and Analysis Center.
Bitcoin has been holding a strong support at $6500 for the last few days. Though it may end up breaking this level, it does seem that the bearish momentum and sentiment is giving way.
The Golem is Alive
Within the crypto market, many are celebrating a different kind of milestone.
One of the first ICO's ever has just released the first iteration of their Ethereum based platform. This innovative company known as Golem aims to be the Air bnb of computers by allowing people to rent out unused computing power.
Though there are some concerns about network scaling should this app go viral, the price of Ethereum is up sharply following the successful product launch.
This is a log scale chart of Ethereum, which shows the relative percentage movements. It's been a long journey so far and though this last pullback may have been gut-wrenching for those who got in at the top, we're still several orders of magnitude above the prices of last February.
As always, let me know if you need anything from my end. Have a fantastic day ahead!
eToro, Senior Market Analyst
Disclosure: This content is for information and educational purposes only and should not be considered investment advice or an investment recommendation. Past performance is not an indication of future results. All trading carries risk. Only risk capital you're prepared to lose.