SNB & CHF

Swiss authorities have been targeting money laundering (Keystone) A massive money laundering case unfolded on Tuesday in a Swiss cantonal court where an Englishman, his wife and a financial adviser were found guilty in an elaborate multimillion-franc scheme. The district courtexternal link in the canton of Vaud sentenced the unidentified Englishman to a year in prison on charges of laundering nearly CHF7 million ($7.34...

 Bank of England warn that “bigger systemic risk” now than in 2008 BOE, Prudential Regulation Authority (PRA) concerns re financial system Banks accused of “balance sheet trickery” -undermining spirit of post-08 rules  EU & UK corporate bond markets may be bigger source of instability than ’08 Credit card debt and car loan surge could cause another financial crisis PRA warn banks returning to similar practices to...

  Old Truism Readers are surely aware of the saying “sell in May and go away”. It is one of the best-known and oldest stock market truisms. And the saying is justified. In my article “Sell in May and Go Away – in 9 out of 11 Countries it Makes Sense to Do So” in the May 01 2017 issue of Seasonal Insights I examined the so-called Halloween effect in great detail. The result: in just two out of eleven international stock...

Completing a busy day of US economic data, Industrial Production was, like retail sales and inflation data, highly disappointing. Prior months were revised slightly lower, leaving IP year-over-year up just 2% in June 2017 (estimates for May were initially 2.2%). Revisions included, the annual growth rate has been stuck around 2% now for three months in a row, suggesting like those other accounts a pause or even...

Swiss Franc The euro has appreciated by 0.47% to 1.1051 CHF. EUR/CHF and USD/CHF, July 20(see more posts on EUR/CHF, USD/CHF, ) Source: markets.ft.com - Click to enlarge FX Rates The US dollar is enjoying a firmer tone against the major currencies today. It does not appear to be simply position adjustments ahead of the ECB meeting. Consider that Australia reported strong employment data, and after making new highs,...

(GLOBALINTELHUB.COM) Dover, DE — 7/18/2017 — Hidden in plain site, as the Trump administration finally released something of substance regarding the so called promised “Trade Negotiation” we see FX take center stage in the global drama unfolding.  As noted on a Zero Hedge article: The much anticipated document (press release and link to full document) released by U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer said the...

An international meeting on transparency and exchange of tax data is underway in the Swiss city of Geneva. The five-day gathering of the Global Forum peer review group is to examine the implementation of so-called group requests and the issue of the identification of beneficial owners, according to the State Secretariat for International Financial Matters. “This meeting confirms that Switzerland supports the...

Summary: OPEC meets on July 24. Nigeria and Libya may be pressured to cap output although they were exempt from quotas. US exports and refining appear to be the driving force behind the 13.8 mln barrel decline in inventories. Mexico has reportedly made two large oil finds. It may not be on your economic calendar, but on July 24 OPEC meets in St. Petersburg, and there is a reasonably good chance that efforts to...

Retail sales were thoroughly disappointing in June. Whereas other accounts such as imports or durable goods had at least delivered a split decision between adjusted and unadjusted versions, for retail sales both views of them were ugly. Seasonally-adjusted first, spending last month was down for the second straight time. Worse than that, estimated sales were just barely more than in January. The economy in 2017 is not...

We do not like Purchasing Power or Real Effective Exchange Rate (REER) as measurement for currencies. For us, the trade balance decides if a currency is overvalued. Only the trade balance can express productivity gains, while the REER assumes constant productivity in comparison to trade partners. Who has read Michael Pettis, knows that a rising trade surplus may also be caused by a higher savings rate while the trade...