Month: November 2018

Wednesday, 28^th November 2018

The real issue with cryptocurrencies….

I’m concerned about Bitcoin….

Not about the recent price crash. That is what it is….

I’m concerned about what is happening behind the market action that grabs the headlines….

I’m concerned about why it is happening….

And about what it could mean….

But before I get onto that, Bitcoin’s nose-dive cannot be avoided. It is a major feature of the developing story….

• This time last year….

This time last year, Bitcoin rode high. The price had burst through the $10,000 ceiling and was on-course for a mid-December high-point of $19,783….

This time last year, Bitcoin promised to make all of us rich. No man left behind….

All you had to do was figure out how to buy some, put your cash down and watch the price head for the moon….

There was no limit to where Bitcoin might go. $10,000 was just the beginning….

Bitcoin proponents were in a dog-fight for headlines. No prediction was too optimistic or too outlandish. It was like a no-limit poker game with every player thinking he held the winning hand….

$40,000 said Mike Novogratz. Ran Neuner said $50,000. Tai Lopez said $60,000.… Click here to read more

Thursday, 22^nd November 2018

The big winner when the crash comes….

Global stocks continue to take a pounding….

For sure, there was an element of bounce-back at work yesterday. But across the board, major indices were trading at the lower end of their respective 52-week range….

That was the case in London on the FTSE 100 and the FTSE 250….

It was the case on the major US bourses – the Dow Jones Industrial Average, the S&P 500 and the NASDAQ Composite….

It was the case on the European mainland – on the German DAX and the French CAC 40….

And it was the case in Asia on the Nikkei 225 and the Hang Seng Index in Hong Kong….

They say trends are made for bucking – but nowhere on the planet are markets or investors bucking this one….

• This is not a massacre – not yet….

Of course, it’s tempting to look at the action on global indices over the last month or so and to see it as some sort of massacre….

But let’s not get ahead of ourselves. Let’s not lose our sense of perspective….

It doesn’t pay to get too caught up in the here-and-now – at least where markets and big issues are concerned.… Click here to read more

Thursday, 15^th November 2018

Certain of one thing in these uncertain times….

‘One should never disregard it. It is the leading fear gauge. It scares the hell out of investors when it moves….’

That’s what Stephen Innes said earlier this week….

He’s the Head of Trading for Asia Pacific out in Singapore. And he’s talking about the VIX – or the CBOE Volatility Index….

2018 is the year that volatility returned to global stock markets – with a vengeance….

• Spooked ahead of Christmas….

Back in February the reading on the VIX was 29.06….

What that figure told us is that stock market investors were more fearful in February 2018 than they had been at any time since the last global financial crisis almost a decade earlier….

And that feeling of fear was all-the-more shocking because it suddenly spiked after a year of relative calm – a 12-month period of supine investor complacency….

Let me be clear, the markets are not experiencing those February levels of fear right now. Not quite….

But a current VIX reading  of 21.25 tells us that stock market investors are plenty spooked as we head towards Christmas – and not just in the US and the S&P 500 index that the VIX reading is most-closely associated with….… Click here to read more