InvestMacro Forex News

By MoneyMorning.com.au

Rick Rule is a smart guy.

When it comes to resource investing there probably isn’t another person on Earth who knows more about the sector.

After listening to him speak for an hour last Tuesday it strikes us that Rick eats, sleeps and breathes resource stocks.

So you could be forgiven for thinking Rick is a resource stock spruiker.

But he’s far from that. In fact, he says 800 Aussie resource stocks are probably valueless in this current market.

That’s a worrying and encouraging figure. Why encouraging? We’ll explain now…

During a bull market it’s almost impossible not to make money.

If you’ll pardon the expression, you really have to screw up not to make money during a bull market.

The task in a bull market is to make the most of the opportunity. That means picking individual stocks to help you get a better return than if you just invested in the index.

The only real way you can do that is to invest in stocks that are outside the biggest top 50 stocks. And if you want to really do better than the average investor then you need to look at some of the smallest stocks on the market – small-cap stocks.

Bet on Resource Stocks When Others Have Given Up

Trouble is small-cap stocks are risky.

If you get in at the wrong time, when stocks are at the top of a bull market then small-cap stocks can fall a long way when the market turns.

This is why we always recommend you don’t invest more than you can afford to lose. After all, the market can turn at any time. It’s only with hindsight that you know for sure when the market has hit the top (or bottom).

Now, you may expect us to say that the real skill is to make money from resource stocks in a falling market.

Experience tells us that’s hard, if not close to impossible. If your aim is to make money in a falling market you’ve got two options. One is to short sell stocks, the other is to be extremely picky over which stocks to punt on.

Because even in a bear market, some resource stocks can go up. That’s usually due to news driven events, such as a new resource discovery or a resource upgrade.

But the best time to punt on resource stocks to get the biggest bang for your buck isn’t during a bull market or in the middle of a bear market, it’s when most folks have given up on resource stocks. It’s also when you can identify the beginning of a new trend.

Put those two factors together and it spells a great opportunity for speculators to get into the market before the next bull market rally begins…

The Resource Sector is the BOOM Sector

We can’t think of any other industry quite like the resource sector.

It seems to have more booms and busts than every other sector combined – including technology and biotech.

Of course, you get a general resource boom. Examples include the periods from 2003 to 2007, and 2009 to 2010. But you also get commodity-specific booms.

These happen much more frequently. Over the past six years we can think of booms in gold, silver, iron ore, rare earths, natural gas, potash and graphene. And let’s not forget the many uranium booms over the past 20 years (Rick Rule explained how he made a lot of money from the 1990′s uranium boom).

These commodity-specific booms tend to happen in waves. Speculators jump from one to the next, looking for the next opportunity to clean up.

The thing to note about these booms is that it’s not just obscure never-heard-of commodities that can boom. Who hasn’t heard of gold, silver, iron ore and natural gas?

But in recent months it seems as though investors have competely lost interest in the resource stock story. We, for one, can’t think of a single commodity-specific boom.

In fact, investors have focused so much effort on dividend stocks and other booming sectors such as technology that they’ve forgotten about the moneymaking possibilities in resource stocks.

Our bet is that attitude is about to change and the trend will turn.

Spotting a Trend

In our view there are a couple of key factors to look for when trying to pick the next resource trend. It’s not fool proof, but it gives you the best chance of getting into the market ahead of other investors.

As it turns out, it’s pretty much the same simple technique Rick Rule uses to spot new trends.

First, you have to find a commodity that has taken a bigger beating than any other commodity. If the commodity has high inventory levels at warehouses such as the London Metals Exchange (LME) that’s even better. It suggests there’s a glut of supply and that producers are struggling to make money in a buyers’ market.

The second thing to look for is a key trend that could drastically change the demand dynamics. That is, is something happening somewhere in industry that could cause demand to skyrocket…more than enough to soak up the existing supply glut.

This is happening across the resource industry now. But there’s one specific commodity where we see this trend taking place now, and few others appear to have caught on.

As always with small-cap resource plays there’s no guarantee the bet will pay off. But with a low commodity price, high inventory levels, and multi-year low prices for the stocks involved, this is about as good as it gets for risk-hungry investors.

Cheers,
Kris+

From the Port Phillip Publishing Library

Special Report: Read This or Retire Poor

Join Money Morning on Google+

By The Sizemore Letter

I love China stocks as an investment … for the next few years, anyway.

As I wrote recently, Chinese stocks are almost ridiculously cheap at current prices. Plus, the reorganization of the Chinese economy away from investment and export and into “Western-style” domestic consumption should create incredible opportunities for Chinese stocks, as well as for American and European firms selling to the Chinese consumer.

Opportunities to invest in major shifts like this only come around a couple times in a lifetime. I am currently long China and have no immediate plans to sell.

But as bullish as I am on China stocks at this time, investors need to keep the big picture in mind.

Demographics Will Hamper China Stocks

Chinese stocks are a great trade — and I believe a great multiyear trade — but they’re not something you should consider as a long-term investment. China is facing demographic collapse in the decades ahead, and I say this as a sober analyst, not a wild-eyed doom-and-gloomer.

When I speak of “demographic collapse,” I’m not talking about plague, pestilence or a scene from a Mad Max movie. I’m talking about a Japanese-style economic malaise, a prolonged period of slow growth, falling asset values and falling consumer prices.

Like Japan, China has a society that is aging rapidly. By the Chinese government’s own demographic estimates, the number of people above age 60 in China is projected to increase to 437 million, or 30% of the population, by 2050.

Last year, the number was 194 million, or 14.3% of the population.

I know, I know. Life begins at 40, and 60 is the new 30. People are living and staying active far longer than they used to. But underneath this cheery optimism is a far more grim reality. After the age of about 50, consumers in advanced economies tend to spend less of their income and save more, and China’s middle and upper classes will be no different than their Japanese and Western counterparts.

Once you reach a certain age, you already own the largest and most expensive home you ever plan to own, you’ve already paid off the mortgage, and you’ve already furnished it. You continue to spend money on basic necessities and simple luxuries. But your purchases of the large, big-ticket items slow to almost zero.

All else equal, an aging population will mean a stagnating domestic economy and a shrinking tax base … even while government expenditures rise. And as Japan is discovering now — and China will discover in the decades ahead — there is no obvious solution.

Few Answers for China & Others

I recently had a good-natured Twitter argument with fellow InvestorPlace contributor Aaron Levitt. Levitt took the view that, faced with an aging population, China will simply raise its birthrate.

@CharlesSizemore Didn’t Mao say that China “will make babies like it never did before” when threatened with nuclear war? Still applies.

— Aaron Levitt (@AaronLevitt) October 29, 2013

Alas, if only it were that simple.

Raising the birthrate requires young women of childbearing age. And as the following chart should make abundantly clear, potential Chinese mothers are about to be in increasingly short supply:

This demographic data comes directly from the United Nations. The number of Chinese women aged 20-24 is already in decline, and the number of women aged 25-29 goes into steep decline starting in 2015.

True enough, women in advanced countries are having children later in life, and Chinese women could follow this trend. But the population of Chinese women aged 30-34 and 35-39 go into steep decline in 2020 and 2025, respectively.

If there is to be a Chinese baby boom, it had better happen fast.

But it’s doubtful that will happen. There is the little problem of the one-child policy, which prevents most urban middle-class Chinese families from having more than one child. And there is the simple reality that, once a society adapts to having a low birthrate, it’s hard to turn that battleship on a dime. Living costs have risen in the cities to the point that large families are not economically viable for the vast majority of Chinese households.

Could the Chinese government implement strong pro-natal policies that economically incentivize Chinese women to have more kids? Maybe, but for several years Russia has been offering cash rewards of $10,000 to mothers for the birth of their second child, and the Russian birthrate is still well below the replacement rate.

And Chinese citizens, having experienced economic freedoms in recent decades, are not as pliant to government decrees as they once were.

Again, I am still wildly bullish on Chinese stocks for the next one to four years. But looking into the decades ahead, China will hit a demographic brick wall — and China stocks will react accordingly.

Charles Lewis Sizemore, CFA, is the chief investment officer of the investment firm Sizemore Capital Management. As of this writing, he did not hold a position in any of the aforementioned securities. Click here to receive his FREE 8-part investing series that will not only show you which sectors will soar, but also which stocks will deliver the highest returns. This series starts Nov. 5 and includes a FREE copy of his 2014 Macro Trend Profit Report.

This article first appeared on Sizemore Insights as China’s Demographic Collapse

Join the Sizemore Investment Letter – Premium Edition

Article by Investazor.com

This week has started with a shortage of the US dollar. Investors went for riskier currencies (Euro, Cable, Aussie, Kiwi, etc.), from the first hours of trading. The stock indices continued to trade sideways while gold and silver had a pretty interesting jump, but did not keep the gains.

This week can get very interesting starting with tomorrow. In the table below you will find the economic indicators that might have the highest impact on the Forex market and will be published in the economic calendars.

By far one of the most important days is Thursday. Australia will announce its Employment Change and Unemployment Rate, but the main events are the MPC Rate Statement and the Minimum Bid Rate for the ECB, followed by the ECB press conference. And if this it isn’t enough, the United States will release their advanced GDP and Unemployment Claims.As you can see RBA will publish its cash rate and statement, Switzerland will release the CPI, Great Britain will have the Services PMI, United States will publish the ISM Non-Manufacturing PMI and New Zealand will announce it employment change and unemployment rate. Wednesday Australia will publish the Trade Balance, for Great Britain it will be released the Manufacturing Production and for Canada the Ivey PMI and Building Pemits.

Friday the party will continue with the RBA Monetary policy, China’s Trade Balance, the Canadian Unemployment rate and the well-known Non-Farm Employment Change, which Federal Reserve is observing closely, and Unemployment rate. The day will end with a speech from Fed Chairman, Ben Bernanke.

The week will end with the Chinese CPI and Industrial Production on Saturday.

During the publishing of these indicators and events the volatility will rise for the Forex Market, but not only. If there will be surprises from the Central Banks, changes in their Monetary Policy or big differences between the forecast values and the actual values of the indicators, we can expect for interesting moves.

It is recommended for traders to adjust their trading strategy for high volatility and also to reconsider their money management so that losses can be stopped as soon as possible.

The post Prepare for High Volatility in the Forex Market appeared first on investazor.com.

by George Leong, B.Comm.

The easy money will continue to be pumped into the economy by the Federal Reserve, but the difference, I think, will be that the soft tone will have less of an impact on the stock market than in the previous years. As was widely expected and to no one’s surprise, the Federal Reserve sat on its hands and did nothing with its current bond buying. So its status quo again as we move ahead and get ready to welcome in Janet Yellen as the next chairman of the Federal Reserve.

Based on the subsequent reaction by the stock market, the news was clearly discounted. The only thing was what the Federal Reserve would say about the economic renewal.

As I have said on numerous occasions, the Federal Reserve, in spite of adding over $3.0 trillion in debt to its balance sheet, continues to see America in flux and unable to shake its demons. By this I mean the economic renewal, while in place, remains at a tepid pace. Consumer spending is just not where you want to see it, and I think the advance reading for the third-quarter gross domestic product (GDP) growth on Thursday will point to this. Also, the jobs market continues to be caught in a vacuum.

“Available data suggest that household spending and business fixed investment advanced, while the recovery in the housing sector slowed somewhat in recent months,” said the Federal Reserve. Notice the comment on the housing market which I said was heading down.

Of course, for market participants, the cloudy forecast from the Federal Reserve will likely mean the tapering of the monthly bond buying will continue past the December Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) meeting and into early to mid-2014 before any tapering begins.

As the next head of the central bank, Janet Yellen will likely maintain the quantitative easing as long as she can with her dovish reputation as an economist who supports the backing of loose monetary policy to help economic stalling.

Yet for investors, the direction of the stock market will be less driven by the easy money and the Federal Reserve, and will likely shift more to how the economy and corporate America are faring. The economic renewal will likely be flat throughout 2014, and we know corporate revenue growth continues to be a major issue that helps support the sluggish economy.

Given this, I expect gains will be harder to come by in 2014. And while the stock market could head higher, the easy money made in stocks will have passed. If the upcoming holiday shopping season for the retail sector is as soft as some pundits predict, we could be in for a rough end to the year. As such, a prudent investment strategy would be to take some profits off the table and cut some of your losers prior to the year-end.

This article More Easy Money Signals Tougher Times Ahead for U.S. Economy was originally published at InvestmentContrarians

By Sasha Cekerevac, BA

Another day and another record-high stock market is what it seems like these days. That must mean that the economic recovery in America is close at hand, right?

Not so fast; the data on job creation appears to show that the situation is actually worsening.

Job creation is crucial to this economic recovery. While it is true that job creation is a lagging indicator, we do need to see an increase to verify whether or not the economic recovery is actually accelerating.

While the stock market might be cheering the Federal Reserve’s decision to continue pumping out money, I worry that all of this excess cash is losing its effectiveness. We are not seeing any positive impact of this monetary policy on Main Street, and things are beginning to deteriorate.

The latest monthly release of the ADP National Employment Report, produced by Automatic Data Processing, Inc. (NASDAQ/ADP), showed that job creation from September to October amounted to just 130,000 new positions, worse than the expected 151,000. (Source: Automated Data Processing, Inc. web site, October 30, 2013.)

I know what you’re going to say: this decline in job creation is not a sign of a poor economic recovery, but rather a result of the U.S. government shutdown.

If that’s true, then why has job creation been decelerating for the past few months? Take a look at the job creation table below, and tell me whether our economic recovery is accelerating or decelerating:

While I would agree that the government shutdown did impact the economic recovery, that’s just an excuse. There is no way that business owners began worrying about a two-week government shutdown in July

In reality, it’s quite disappointing, since there was a glimmer of hope last winter that perhaps the economic recovery might take hold and job creation would begin accelerating. Looking at the past few months, I don’t know how anyone believes that our economy is on the verge of booming.

Compare the last few months of private sector job creation to the stock markets, like the S&P 500.

            Chart courtesy of www.StockCharts.com

Clearly, there is a vast difference between the trend over the past few months in our economic recovery and the stock market.

While there were positive signs that perhaps job creation was about to pick up at several points over the past year and a half, clearly since the summer, we have seen very little encouraging news.

If job creation and a strong economic recovery aren’t pushing up stocks, what is?

I believe the vast majority of the move up this year has been primarily generated by the Federal Reserve and its easy monetary policy.

The Federal Reserve’s goal was to improve job creation. However, things appear to be worsening. If the Federal Reserve has its foot on the gas and the economic recovery sputters and fails, what other options are really left?

That’s a real concern for me, since the emergency action taken by the Federal Reserve has been overused. It is now creating bubbles in many markets, and as you see, it’s having little impact on job creation.

Bubbles are fun on the way up, but they’re painful when they pop.

With the stock market at all-time highs and the economic recovery failing to accelerate, something has to give. We can’t continue having an ever-higher stock market on ever-decelerating job creation and companies are having difficulty growing revenue.

As I stated over the past couple of months, trying to time a market top is impossible, but I believe we are getting ever closer to a peak in the market. I would recommend taking profits and raising cash. Yes, I do realize that you don’t want to have funds sitting idle, but impatience and “rushing” to follow the herd is never a good long-term strategy.

This article Why Having Cash Sitting Idle May Be Your Best Investment Strategy Right Now was originally published at InvestmentContrarians

By www.CentralBankNews.info     Uganda’s central bank maintained its Central Bank Rate (CBR) at the neutral level of 12.0 percent given that core inflation is projected to decline to the bank’s 5.0 percent target and that real economic growth is now close to the economy’s long-term potential growth of 6-7 percent.
    The Bank of Uganda (BOU), which raised its rate by 100 basis points in September and warned in October that it would raise rates again if core inflation accelerates, said the balance of upside and downside risks to inflation were now roughly even.
    The BOU forecasts annual core inflation to remain in a range of 6.5-7.5 percent over the next 12 months and then decline towards 5.0 percent in 2015. Last month the BOU forecast 7-8 percent core inflation over the next year but also saw inflation easing towards its target.
    Uganda’s headline inflation rate eased to 8.1 percent in October from 8.4 percent while the core inflation rate declined to 7.2 percent from 7.4 percent as monthly food crop prices declined by 1.0 percent after two months of steep rises.
    The central bank said the inflation outlook was still subject to a degree of uncertainty and while food prices may have peaked, it was too early to be definitive. Buoyant domestic demand may also limit the decline in core inflation over the medium term.

    Uganda’s economy has improved this year with growth in the second calendar quarter rising by 2.1 percent from the first quarter for annual growth of 5.7 percent, up from 5.4 percent.
    The central bank said data for the first quarter of the current 2013/14 financial year, which began on July 1, “indicates a buoyant level of economic activity which if maintained would be consistent with growth of 6 percent or above for the 2013/14 fiscal year.”
    Last month Uganda’s statistics office revised upwards its estimate for growth in financial 2012/13 to 5.8 percent from an earlier estimate of 5.1 percent and the bank also predicted growth of 6.0 percent for the current financial year.
    The BOU’s rate rise in September was aimed at limiting the pass-through of higher food prices to non-food prices. The rate rise reversed a 100 basis point rate cut in June that was aimed at stimulating demand.

    www.CentralBankNews.info

By George Leong, B.Comm.

There’s some buzz surrounding the video gaming market again with the pending releases of the “PlayStation 4” by Sony Corporation (NYSE/SNE) and the “Xbox One” by Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ/MSFT).

As I recently discussed, the release of new gaming and entertainment consoles generate excitement and drive up the demand for games. (Read “Why the Gaming Sector Should Be on Your Radar.”) In this column, I wrote about Electronic Arts Inc. (NASDAQ/EA) and Activision Blizzard, Inc. (NASDAQ/ATVI), but a much smaller gaming software maker that I expect could deliver some impressive numbers, based on my stock analysis, is Take-Two Interactive Software, Inc. (NASDAQ/TTWO).

If you are a fan of the infamous “Grand Theft Auto” series, you also probably know that the creator is Take-Two Interactive. The recent launch of its latest version, “Grand Theft Auto V,” is breaking all records for the series, as the company said it has already sold 29 million copies in the first six weeks of sales. That’s impressive and will generate well over $1.5 billion in revenues, which is more than the company’s trailing 12 months of sales, according to my stock analysis.In addition to Grand Theft Auto, Take-Two Interactive publishes games under two labels: Rockstar Games and 2K. The 2K label publishes under three more labels: 2K Games, 2K Sports, and 2K Play.

My stock analysis suggests that the stock should be doing better with the projected sales. Take-Two Interactive is still up 61% over the past 52 weeks, easily beating the 25.5% return of the S&P 500. But in comparison, over the same period, Electronic Arts is up 95%!

On a valuation basis, Take-Two Interactive is comparatively cheaper versus Electronic Arts and Activision Blizzard, as reflected in the table below.

While Take-Two Interactive is cheaper than Electronic Arts and Activision Blizzard on a price-to-sales (P/S) basis, the key variable to note is how low Take-Two Interactive’s price-to-earnings growth (PEG) ratio is at 0.52, according to my stock analysis (a reading of below 1.0 suggests a cheap valuation). This implies the stock is trading at less than its estimated five-year earnings growth, which is cheap, as my stock analysis indicates.

Take-Two Interactive has beaten the Thomson Financial consensus earnings-per-share (EPS) estimates in four straight quarters. However, as my stock analysis indicates, the issue that I see is that while revenues are estimated to grow at 65.8% to $2.03 billion in fiscal 2014 (ending in March), there’s a drop off of 32.6% in fiscal 2015, according to Thomson Financial. This is a real problem that Take-Two Interactive will face, according to my stock analysis.

The chart shows the bullish golden cross and upward trend. Traders could see a pop to above $20.00 for some profits if the company can deliver a strong fiscal third and fourth quarter, based on my stock analysis.

Chart courtesy of www.StockCharts.com

But until Take-Two Interactive can come up with other successful games, the stock will continue to be a target for traders who trade on the success of the Grand Theft Auto series.

This article Small Game Developer Set to Generate Short-Term Gains is originally published at Profitconfidential

London Gold Market Report
from Adrian Ash
BullionVault
Mon 4 Nov 07:40 EST

WHOLESALE trade in London left the price of gold sitting at last week’s finish of $1317 per ounce Monday morning, as European shares rose with government bond prices but commodities slipped.

 Silver also held flat, trading near $21.90 per ounce – more than 5% below last Wednesday’s 5-week high.

 The Euro ticked higher from a 6-week low to the Dollar.

 “Gold could claw back some gains,” says the weekly note from Japanese conglomerate Mitsubishi, “as bargain-hunters re-enter the market and if the Dollar weakens on poorer than expected US economic data.”

 This week brings October’s official Non-Farm Payrolls data on Friday.

 Consensus forecasts are for the smallest net addition since January at 130,000.

 If weak US data mean quantitative easing “continues at the current rate for longer than expected,” says Robin Bhar at French investment and bullion bank Societe Generale, “then…further declines in the gold price may be delayed.”

 But SocGen’s commodity team “still expect gold to fall towards $1100 next year” however.

 Shorter term, “a batch of gold selling – likely from the [mining] community – scared all the small bidders [last week],” says one London trading desk.

 “Gold miners are clearly looking at securing some of their future bullion sales.”

 Output from No.1 gold mining nation China will hit a record of 430 tonnes in 2013, according to China Gold Group Corp.

 Consumers will meantime buy some 1,000 tonnes, reckons vice-general manager Du Haiqing, speaking at an industry conference in Tianjin.

 Likely to overtake India as the world’s No.1 buyers, China’s “consumption will gradually cool down” starting 2014, says Du, “as consumers become more rational.”

 Meantime in India, and “despite the festival season of Dhanteras and Diwali,” says the weekly note from German-based refining giant Heraeus, “support from this was missing” for gold in October.

 “Demand was being met by recycled metal as well as via illegal channels.”

 “Physical demand continues to be lackluster,” says Swiss refiner MKS in a note quoted by Bloomberg today.

 “[Indian] jewelry stockists and retail investors [only] made token purchases of gold,” MoneyControl says of the Diwali festival “to mark the beginning of the new Hindu Samvat year 2070.”

 Gold over the last 12 months “offered negative returns [to Indian buyers] for the first time in fifteen Samvat years,” notes the Business Standard.

 Western investment demand meantime saw net outflows of 6 tonnes last week from the giant SPDR Gold Trust (ticker: GLD), taking the quantity of gold needed to back the world’s one-time largest exchange traded fund to a new 57-month low of 866 tonnes.

 But whilst big-money mandates and institutional investors remain shy, total gold coin sales by the US Mint so far in 2013 have already overtaken full-year 2012, according to data on its website.

 Sales of American Eagle and Buffalo gold coins stood at 993,500 ounces by end-Oct., says the Mint. That contrasts with total 2012 sales of 885,000 ounces.

 Silver coin sales from the US Mint meantime stand “near a new annual record” notes one retail dealer, after strong October sales to distributors took 2013’s running total to 39.175 million ounces, just shy of 2011’s record 39.869 million.

 “We remain bullish gold,” says a Singapore dealing desk today. But gold “might be further tested before investors regain faith in the yellow precious metal,” it adds, putting nearby support at $1300 per ounce.

 Rising Spanish bond prices meantime pushed Madrid’s borrowing costs down to the lowest level in more than 3 years.

 The US Dollar edged back from multi-week highs to the Euro and Sterling after new data showed the Eurozone’s manufacturing sector expanding as forecast and the UK’s construction sector surging at the fastest pace since spring 2007.

The Pound rallied from a 2-week low of $1.5900 on the news, edging gold for UK investors down to £822 per ounce.

Adrian Ash

BullionVault

Gold price chart, no delay | Buy gold online

Adrian Ash is head of research at BullionVault, the secure, low-cost gold and silver market for private investors online, where you can fully allocated bullion already vaulted in your choice of London, New York, Singapore, Toronto or Zurich for just 0.5% commission.

(c) BullionVault 2013

Please Note: This article is to inform your thinking, not lead it. Only you can decide the best place for your money, and any decision you make will put your money at risk. Information or data included here may have already been overtaken by events – and must be verified elsewhere – should you choose to act on it.

By HY Markets Forex Blog

Asian stocks  were seen trading lower on Monday, trimming gains seen in the previous session from the upbeat China data and ahead of the highly anticipated Chinese Community Party meeting scheduled later during the week.

Shares in the Asia-Pacific region began the trading session in green, driven by the sign of rapid growth in China. The official Non-Manufacturing Purchasing Managers Index (PMI) came in at 56.3 in October, advancing to a 14-month high.

The upbeat data had a positive effect on the equities, as stocks in the region dropped later in the session and investors focus on the upcoming key meeting of China’s Communist Party, where members of the party is expected to discuss China’s economic agenda. China’s Communist Party’s upcoming meeting is scheduled from November 9-12, in Beijing.

Meanwhile, the US Federal Reserve’s (Fed) tapering is still in the spotlight, despite the forecasted outcome of the Open Market Committee (FOMC) meeting last week.

Asian Stocks – China

Hong Kong’s benchmark Hang Seng was seen flat, edging 0.12% lower to 23,220.00, while the mainland benchmark in Shanghai declined 0.05% lower to 2,147.75 points.

Down from the gains seen from the string of upbeat data’s released on Friday, including the above-forecasted gross domestic product (GDP) growth published in October. The second largest economy grew an annual 7.8% in the third quarter, after China’s growth dropped 7.5% lower in the June quarter.

“China’s Steel PMI in October contracted for two consecutive months, down to 47.5 from 49.2 in September. This does not necessarily contradict with China’s overall PMI expansion in October. In fact, if you look at the detailed breakdown, China’s October overall PMI expansion was fueled by output PMI only, other sub indexes mostly pointed to slowed pace in tapering, especially, new order PMI slowed in October to 52.5 from 52.8 in September,” Helen Lau, senior analyst for UOB Kay Hian, stated in a note.

Kunlun Energy was the session’s main movers, climbing 3.6 higher, while Tingyi Cayman Islands Holding dropped 3%.

HSBC holdings are expected to announce its earnings report for the third-quarter after the market closes later today.

Interested in trading Asian Stocks Online?

Visit www.hymarkets.com and start trading today with only $50.

The post Asian Stocks Clears Previous Gains On China PMI appeared first on | HY Markets Official blog.

Article provided by HY Markets Forex Blog

By HY Markets Forex Blog

Eurozone PMI climbed to 51.3 points in October, rising from last month’s record of 51.1, Markit Economics confirmed.

“The eurozone manufacturing economy is undergoing its strongest growth period for two-and-a-half years, since the mounting uncertainty caused by the escalating sovereign debt crisis hit businesses hard in 2011.” Chris Williamson, chief economist at Markit Economics said.

“While it is in some respects disappointing that the PMI has failed to show a steeper pick-up over the last two months, the recent growth revealed by the survey indicates a marked turnaround in the health of the manufacturing economy. While the survey was signaling a 2-3% annual rate of decline in industrial production earlier in the year, a 2-3% rate of expansion is now being indicated.” Williamson said.

“However, while the recovery goes on, it is by all measures frustratingly slow. In particular, the modest gains in output and new orders remain insufficient to encourage firms to take on more staff. More encouraging indications about the recovery can be gained by looking at the increasingly broad-based nature of the upturn, and especially the fact that increasingly robust gains in production are now being seen in countries such as Spain, Italy and Ireland, to suggest that structural reforms to boost competitiveness are starting to pay off”, Williamson also commented.

Eurozone PMI – Germany & Spain PMI Climbs

The Final PMI for Germany’s manufacturing sector saw a climb to 51.7 in October, exceeding forecasts of 51.5 in a flash reading and up from 51.1 points seen in the previous month.

Meanwhile the industrial sector for Spain saw a jump in October, while the manufacturing PMI was seen above the 50-threshold for the third month in a row, advancing to 50.9 points, up from 50.7 seen in the previous month.

Eurozone PMI – France & Italy declines

Italy’s manufacturing sector declined in the month of October, as the country’s PMI dropped down to 50.7 points from 50.8 points  recorded in September.

In France, the manufacturing activity dropped lower in October as the PMI in the country’s manufacturing sector edged lower to 49.1 in October, down from 49.8 seen in the previous month.

Interested in trading In the European Market?

Visit www.hymarkets.com and find out how you can start trading today with only $50.

The post Eurozone PMI Climbs in October appeared first on | HY Markets Official blog.

Article provided by HY Markets Forex Blog