Opinion: Better stock gains — for a privileged few

SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) — The New York Stock Exchange, should it follow through on a report that suggests it will introduce a midday stock auction, isn’t going to incur the wrath of Michael Lewis, who’s latest book, “Flash Boys,” argued that high-speed trading has rigged the markets against regular investors.
But the Big Board, now a unit of Intercontinental Exchange Inc. ICE, +0.42%  , isn’t exactly doing regular retail investors a favor. Its plan to create a midday auction will match big institutional sellers’ bids and offers for big blocks of shares in a bid to win more business away from dark pools where the same process happens off the tape and anonymously.

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Dutch companies to develop small scale LNG

Dutch companies VEKA Group, Deen Shipping and IUVENIS have joined forces with Peter Goedvolk, and will cooperate in the field of trade, transport and bunkering of small scale LNG in Northwest Europe.
Goedvolk recently established Count, a commodity, trading and logistics company.
VEKA Group and Deen Shipping previously launched an LNG company, LNG Bunkering Service B.V. and announced the construction of the first LNG bunker tanker, LNG PRIME.
The LNG PRIME will be active in the Amsterdam, Rotterdam, Antwerp (ARA) region, bunkering seagoing vessels as early as the start of 2016.

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Mattel Reports Fourth Quarter and Full Year 2014 Financial Results

Fourth Quarter Highlights

• Worldwide net sales down 6% (including an unfavorable impact from changes in currency exchange rates of 3%);
• North American Region¹ gross sales down 2% and International Region gross sales down 5% (including an unfavorable impact from changes in currency exchange rates of 8%);
• Worldwide gross sales by core brands: Barbie^® down 12%; Hot Wheels^® up 5%; Fisher-Price^® down 11% and American Girl^® down 4%;
• Gross margin decreased 410 basis points of net sales, partially due to the acquisition of MEGA^® Brands;
• SG&A increased 390 basis points of net sales, including the impact of the acquisition of MEGA Brands;
• Operating income of $237.0 million compared to operating income of $479.3 million in the fourth quarter of 2013; and
• Earnings per share of $0.44 (includes a negative impact of $0.05 per share from MEGA Brands integration costs² and a negative tax impact of $0.03 per share) vs. prior year earnings per share of $1.07.

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Pound Sterling to Canadian Dollar (GBP/CAD) Exchange Rate Forecast: ‘Loonie’ Tumbles on GDP Data

he Pound Sterling to Canadian Dollar (GBP/CAD) exchange rate advanced to 1.92 after GDP data out of the North American nation came in below forecasts.
Canada’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) contracted in November as manufacturing dropped the most since January 2009 and as the economy suffered from declines in mining and oil and gas extraction.
According to Statistics Canada the nation’s GDP contracted by -0.2% on a month on month basis, a figure that was worse than the unchanged 0.3%  forecast.
Earlier the Pound Sterling to Canadian Dollar (GBP/CAD) exchange rate surged to a new six year high on Friday as oil prices fell yet again.

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Euro to Canadian Dollar (EUR/CAD) Exchange Rate Forecast: German Retail Sales Jump, Canadian GDP, Eurozone CPI, Unemployment Rate Ahead

The Euro to Canadian Dollar (EUR/CAD) exchange rate recorded gains early in Friday’s European session after German Retail Sales reached higher than forecast levels.
Annual Retail Sales were pulled out of the -1.0% contraction to +4.0%. Economists had expected a smaller 3.6%
Earlier… The Euro to Canadian Dollar (EUR/CAD) exchange rate recorded gains in the second half of Thursday’s European trading after mixed German data and oil price declines.

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USD/CAD – Canadian Dollar Slide Continues, Pair Trading Above 1.26

USD/CAD – Canadian Dollar Slide Continues, Pair Trading Above 1.26

The Canadian dollar continues to lose ground on Thursday. In the North American session, USD/CAD is trading above the 1.26 line and the pair has jumped over 200 points since early Wednesday. On the release front, US numbers were a mix. Unemployment Claims sparkled, dropping to 265 thousand. However, Pending Home Sales declined 3.7%. There are no Canadian releases on Thursday. On Friday, we’ll get a look at the only Canadian event of the week, GDP. The markets are expecting a decline of 0.1%. A weak reading could send the reeling loonie even lower. US employment numbers have improved as the economy chugs along. This was underscored by Unemployment Claims, which plunged to 265 thousand, down from 307 thousand a week earlier. This marked the indicator’s lowest level since April 2000. The news was not as positive from Pending Home Sales, which declined 3.7%, its worst reading in a year.

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Forex Market: EUR/USD daily trading forecast

Yesterday’s trade saw EUR/USD within the range of 1.1262-1.1366. The pair closed at 1.1335, gaining 0.41% on a daily basis.
At 8:42 GMT today EUR/USD was up 0.22% for the day to trade at 1.1342. The pair touched a daily high at 1.1353 at 8:35 GMT.
Fundamentals
Italian unemployment
The rate of unemployment in Italy probably reached a new record high level in December at 13.5%, according to the median forecast by experts, from 13.4% during the prior month. The number of unemployed people dropped 0.2% in November compared to October to reach 3.457 million. At the same time, employment in the country was 0.1% lower to 55.5% to reach 22.31 million persons. Youth unemployment rate climbed 0.6% to a new all-time high of 43.9% in November, according to the National Institute of Statistics.

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China Money Rate Completes Biggest Monthly Decline Since May

(Bloomberg) -- China’s benchmark money-market rate capped the biggest monthly drop since May after the central bank added funds to the financial system to offset capital outflows and meet a seasonal pickup in demand for cash.
The seven-day repurchase rate, a gauge of interbank funding availability, fell 79 basis points in January to 4.17 percent as of 4:30 p.m. in Shanghai, a weighted average from the National Interbank Funding Center shows. It climbed as high as 6.59 percent in January 2014, during the two weeks leading up to the Lunar New Year holiday. Demand for money climbs before and during the weeklong break, which begins Feb. 18 this year, as people exchange gifts and families get together for meals.

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Indicted money exchange ex-worker gets 3 years in U.S. prison

Jan 30 (Reuters) - A former information technology employee at the defunct digital currency exchange Liberty Reserve was sentenced on Friday to three years in a U.S. prison for his role in concealing what authorities described as a massive money laundering business for criminals worldwide.
Maxim Chukharev, 28, will likely serve approximately 10 months, with good behavior, after receiving credit for 10 months in a Costa Rican jail and 10 months in U.S. custody while awaiting trial, his lawyer said.
In court filings, prosecutors acknowledged that Chukharev was the "least culpable" of seven defendants charged with helping to operate Liberty Reserve, which authorities say was used almost exclusively by criminals to process money transfers connected to drug trafficking, child pornography, computer hacking and other crimes.

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Russia cuts interest rates from 17% to 15%

Russia has cut its main interest rate from 17% to 15% because inflation "is stabilising".

The rouble fell by more than 2% against the dollar following the central bank announcement.
Russia's economy has been suffering for a range of reasons, including economic sanctions by the West over its involvement in the crisis in Ukraine.
This week the government said it would put measures in place to try to stave off an economic crisis.
The measures included investing at least 2.34 trillion roubles ($35bn, £23bn) in the economy, following a collapse in oil prices and the rouble.

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Google 4Q Revenue Up But Misses Target: Declining Ad Prices, Exchange Rates, Spending on Projects

Google, in its fourth quarter earnings report, reported revenue of $18.1 billion, a figure that falls short of the expectations set by Wall Street analysts for the company.
While the $18.1 billion revenue for Google represents a 15 percent increase in revenue the company posted in the corresponding period last year, it comes up short against the analyst's revenue forecasts of $18.5 billion.
Shifting exchange rates, including a stronger U.S. dollar, negatively affected the revenue of the company. According to the company's earnings release, Google's revenue would have been higher by $541 million if the foreign exchange rates in the fourth quarter did not change compared with the previous quarter. If such was the case, then Google would have slightly surpassed Wall Street expectations.

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New Exchange Protects User Funds with Segregated Bank Accounts

Hong Kong-based exchange Gatecoin has launched after a lengthy setup process, promising segregated bank accounts for customers in 40 countries across five continents.
The company says it is the first to offer this kind of security, which is common in the non-crypto forex exchange world. This means customer funds are kept in separate bank accounts to the company's own funds, and thus can have funds returned in the case of a force majeure financial event that depletes company reserves.
Gatecoin is a licensed Money Services Operator in Hong Kong. It offers bitcoin trading in USD, EUR and HKD through its low-latency matching engine, and plans to implement Ripple in the next few weeks.

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Blizzard Executives Reportedly Think Heroes of the Storm Will Be a Failure

Blizzard executives reportedly don’t have high hopes for the developer’s upcoming MOBA Heroes of the Storm, with a report suggesting that many of the company’s staff are expected to be laid off following its release to recuperate its losses.
According to contributor Tae Kim of Yahoo Finance, an Activision Blizzard insider released a huge batch of information regarding a number of games Blizzard has in the pipeline, along with details regarding its current games on the market. Along with claiming that Blizzard is now actively working on a 2v2 mode on Hearthstone and that the online trading card game has pulled in numbers that are “off the charts,” the unnamed source then went on to say how Heroes of the Storm could have a detrimental impact upon the company following its release.
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Stocks markets to decline amid slowing growth

TORONTO - The Toronto stock market was set for a lower open Friday as the latest economic growth data pointed to slowing economic growth at the end of last year.
Statistics Canada says gross domestic product in November declined 0.2 per cent, worse than the flat showing that economists had expected. GDP had risen 0.3 per cent in the prior month. The agency said the drop extended across major sectors including manufacturing and mining, quarrying, and oil and gas extraction.
There were also further indications of the damage caused to the energy and financial sectors by the collapse in oil prices.
The Canadian dollar fell to fresh six-year lows on the data, losing 0.45 of a cent to 78.85 cents US.

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UK fund manager predicts stock market plunge during next recession

One of the UK’s most successful hedge-fund managers has issued a stark warning that the global economy faces a downturn that will be “remembered in a hundred years” and leave stock markets facing devastation.
Crispin Odey, best known for anticipating that banks would go bust in 2008, made his gloomy predictions in a missive to clients of his Odey Asset Management business in which he warns that the European Central Bank’s €1.1tn (£730bn) bond-buying programme announced last week will not stave off a slump.
 He is not only pessimistic about the firepower of the central bank to inject life in to moribund eurozone markets but also about China, where recent data showed growth had slowed to 7.4%.

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China money rates rise on seasonal cash pressure, stock exchange repos spike

SHANGHAI, Jan 23 (Reuters) - China's money markets rose on
Friday, with the major benchmark money rate gaining over 24
basis points on cash demand for month-end tax payments and the
looming lunar new year holiday that will close markets for a
week.
    The seven-day bond repurchase agreement closed
out the week averaging over 4.16 percent up from 3.92 percent
the previous Friday, the first time it has done so since
December. Other commonly traded tenors also rose.
    Liquidity conditions remain a subject of intense focus this
week given the condition of the stock market, where regulators
have been moving to tighten up the routing of credit out of the
interbank market and into stocks. 

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Shake Shack readies New York Stock Exchange debut

Nearly 14 years ago, on something of a lark, the restaurateur Danny Meyer opened a Chicago-style hot dog cart in Manhattan’s Madison Square Park, hoping to draw crowds to the park and give summer jobs to the staff at one of his nearby high-end restaurants. That stand has morphed into Shake Shack, a burger-and-crinkle-fries empire with outposts in London, Dubai, Istanbul and Las Vegas.

On Friday, it will begin trading on the New York Stock Exchange with a valuation of about $745 million and will increase Meyer’s net worth by about $155 million.

Conceived as an homage to the friendly Midwestern fast-food joints of Meyer’s childhood, Shake Shack has become one of the most prominent purveyors of fast-casual food. That sector, dominated by the likes of Chipotle, has fundamentally reshaped the fast-food industry with its emphasis on using fresh ingredients with a better backstory.

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European stocks rise on upbeat French, Spanish data; Dax up 0.29%

Investing.com - European stocks were higher on Friday, supported by the release of upbeat data from France and Spain, while investors still awaited reports on euro zone inflation and unemployment due later in the trading session.

During European morning trade, the EURO STOXX 50 added 0.27%, France's CAC 40 edged up 0.23%, while Germany's DAX 30 rose 0.29%.
Official data earlier showed that French consumer spending increased by 1.5% in December, exceeding expectations for a 0.2% rise. November's figure was revised to a 0.2% gain from a previously estimated 0.4% advance.

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Belarusian banks resume online exchange operations

MINSK, 28 January (BelTA) - Belarusian banks are resuming online exchange operations on bank cards, BelTA has learned.

Alfa Bank (Belarus) informs it will be back online for Alfa Click and Alfa Mobile operations on bank cards denominated in Belarusian rubles on 2 February 2015. 

On 26 January Priorbank lifted restrictions on online trading in Belarusian-denominated debit cards in the national segment.


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Waiting for the Fed

EUR/USD: heading towards 1.10 in very near term

In recent weeks, the EUR/USD has corrected far more rapidly to reach 1.12. Developments have accelerated in the eurozone, from the Swiss National Bank (SWB) withdrawing its floor rate and the European Central Bank’s (ECB) announcement of bigger-than expected Quantitative Easing (QE)), to Syriza’s sweeping victory in the Greek elections. All these events accelerated the EUR/USD’s fall, with a low at 1.11.
The ECB’s asset purchase programme of the ECB, it was bigger than expected at EUR 1,140bn through to September 2016, or EUR 60bn per month, with a possible extension if inflation does not recover near the 2% official target.

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