Episodes
President-elect Donald Trump nominated former Florida attorney general Pam Bondi to head the DoJ after his original pick Matt Gaetz decided to withdraw amid allegations of sexual misconduct. In Germany, defence minister Boris Pistorius has declined to stand against unpopular Chancellor Olaf Scholz to head the SPD going into February’s snap election. Lithium ion battery firm Northvolt files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in the U.S., hampering Europe’s EV ambitions. And in crypto news, Bitcoin...
Published 11/22/24
Nvidia posts another stellar quarter to cement its lead in the A.I. race. Its shares, however, dip in after-hours trade. Indian multinational conglomerate Adani Group sees shares nose-dive after billionaire chairman Gautam Adani is charged by U.S. prosecutors with fraud and bribery charges. U.S. retail giant Target is in the red, falling 21.4 per cent in yesterday’s session – its worst trading day in more than two years. The company issued a sales warning ahead of the Christmas shopping...
Published 11/21/24
President-elect Donald Trump appoints Cantor Fitzgerald’s Howard Lutnick to run the Commerce Department. Former WWE wrestling mogul and Small Business Administration leader during Trump’s first term Linda McMahon is given the Education Secretary brief. Apollo CEO Marc Rowan is reportedly is favourite to head up the Treasury. U.S. tech stocks soar helped on by chip giant Nvidia coming close to 5 per cent ahead of the U.S. earnings report. Qualcomm announces it is positive on Trump and...
Published 11/20/24
Asian equities are mainly in the green at the start of the week with the dollar rally pausing after achieving multi-month highs. President-elect Donald Trump appoints Sean Duffy as transport secretary and there are reports of potential in-fighting in the transition team over a growing field of Treasury contenders. The U.S. DoJ is reportedly on the verge of forcing Google to sell its Chrome browser – the latest regulatory push to break up the company’s online search monopoly. We hear...
Published 11/19/24
In what is a major shift in policy, U.S. President Joe Biden has reportedly given Kyiv permission to use U.S.-supplied long-range missiles to strike deep into Russian territory. U.S. indices post their worst session in two weeks as the Trump trade falters. However, Europe still lags Wall Street by a record margin this year. President-elect Donald Trump continues to select his cabinet, naming Big Tech critic Brendan Carr as FCC head and Chris Wright as Energy Secretary. We hear from outgoing...
Published 11/18/24
Markets pare back bets on a December Fed cut, with Wall Street losing ground following hawkish comments from Jerome Powell over the strength of the U.S. economy. Meanwhile in China, fresh data paints a mixed picture on the economy as recent stimulus measures boosts retail sentiment, but the country’s key industrial sector continues to lose steam. In the U.K., Chancellor Rachel Reeves delivers her first Mansion House speech, announcing intentions to target regulation as she warns that the...
Published 11/15/24
President-elect Donald Trump makes a shocking pick for Attorney General, tapping controversial Florida Representative Matt Gaetz for the role. This as NBC News projects Republicans will maintain control of the House in a ‘red sweep’. Meanwhile the Trump trade eases as fresh U.S. inflation data that supports expectations for a December Fed cut. Hedge fund billionaire David Einhorn warns of further price pressure volatility at CNBC’s Delivering Alpha Investor summit. But the crypto rally...
Published 11/14/24
President-elect Donald Trump taps X owner and Tesla CEO Elon to take leadership of the new ‘department of government efficiency’, alongside taking his pick of the new defence and intelligence heads. U.S. market majors snap their post-election winning streak, while Treasury yields spike and the dollar index hits a 6-months high as investors brace for another Trump administration. Meanwhile, Siemens Energy raises its mid-term outlook after reporting a record order backlog of €123 billion,...
Published 11/13/24
Donald Trump’s election victory continues to rally markets, with the S&P 500 topping $6,000 for the first time, and the Dow soaring by more than 300 points to close above the $44,000 mark. Momentum doesn’t stop there as investors jump on the crypto trade, with Bitcoin closing in on the $90,000 mark and Coinbase popping nearly 20%. Meanwhile, sources tell NBC that Senator Marco Rubio is the likely candidate to become Donald Trump’s top diplomat, with the President-elect also said to have...
Published 11/12/24
The S&P 500 and the Dow are clinching their best week of the year in the wake of former President Trump’s secured return to the White House, and the prospect of looser regulation and tax cuts. Cryptocurrency Bitcoin follows suit, soaring above $80,000 as the Trump trade takes hold. This as the President-elect is confirmed to have won Arizona, completing a clean sweep of all the battleground states, with Republicans now closing in on control of the House. Meanwhile, Chinese consumer...
Published 11/11/24
The S&P and Nasdaq attain fresh record highs after the Fed cuts rates for a second consecutive time. However, Fed chair Jerome Powell’s press conference was dominated by questions about his position at the central bank following the re-election of President Donald Trump. Trump rewards his campaign manager Susie Wiles with the position of chief-of-staff, the first key appointment to his White House team. Outgoing President Joe Biden promises to ensure a smooth transition of power. In the...
Published 11/08/24
Wall Street closes at record highs following Donald Trump’s historic win to become the 47th U.S. President. The Dow rallies by 1,500 points thanks to bank stocks after Democratic nominee Kamala Harris concedes the election. In Germany the fragile governing ‘traffic light’ coalition collapses as Chancellor Olaf Scholz fires Finance Minister Christian Lindner over major economic policy disagreements. The move paves the way for a January confidence vote and a likely snap election in March. The...
Published 11/07/24
Donald Trump and Kamala Harris make their final pitches to the U.S. electorate with rallies in the key battleground states of North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Michigan. Wall Street braces itself with global stocks flat while yields slip and the greenback wavers ahead of today’s poll. Boeing workers end their seven-week strike after accepting an improved pay deal. In energy news, Saudi Aramco sees a 15 per cent dip in the third quarter due to weak prices and decreased refining markets. The oil...
Published 11/05/24
The dollar dips with futures relatively flat as a surprise poll puts Kamala Harris ahead in the Republican-leading state of Iowa. National polling still places both candidates neck-and-neck. Berkshire Hathaway continues to dial down its stakes in Apple and BofA, boosting its cash pile to $325bn. The German ruling coalition is in disarray after finance minister Christian Lindner’s economic manifesto causes major rifts with coalition partners, prompting Chancellor Olaf Scholz to summon talks...
Published 11/04/24
Apple shares dip following cautious guidance ahead of Christmas. The company also reveals little about demand for its new iPhone 16. Amazon posts a beat on quarterly earnings causing shares to pop in extended trade. The e-commerce giant’s CEO Andy Jassy pledges to significantly ramp up spending on the company’s A.I. technologies. On Wall Street the S&P 500 and the Nasdaq suffer their worst day in more than a month following disappointing Big Tech results. And in the UK, the gilt sell-off...
Published 11/01/24
Microsoft enjoys an A.I. boom but there are concerns over capex and a slowing cloud division which pulls the share price lower in extended trade. Meta posts a top and bottom line beat but shares also fall in after-hours trade as investors remain anxious over greater A.I. infrastructure expenditure at the social media giant. BNP Paribas notches a near-six per cent quarterly rise in net income and confirms its forecast. CFO Lars Machenil tells CNBC he remains bullish about the trend. There’s a...
Published 10/31/24
UBS posts $1.4bn in Q3 net profit as the lender accelerated the integration of former rival Credit Suisse. Standard Chartered almost doubles its quarterly pre-tax profit which prompts the London-based bank to hike guidance and pledges to lift its dividend payout. Meanwhile in the U.S., Alphabet’s cloud arm delivers stellar results which help push the company’s annual revenues up by 15 per cent in the third quarter, this despite a slowdown in its search and YouTube services. In the UK, gilt...
Published 10/30/24
Novartis posts Q3 earnings with 10 per cent sales growth and 20 per cent core income growth. The drug maker has also hiked its FY guidance. HSBC sees Q3 profits jump by 10 per cent. The lender has also launched a $3bn buyback scheme on the back of slower-than-expected rate cuts. Wall Street begins the week in the green ahead of key inflation data and earnings from the tech sector. In autos news, Volkswagen is warning of unprecedented plant closures and mass lay-offs as the German giant...
Published 10/29/24
The ruling LDP in Japan loses its parliamentary majority in its worst defeat more than a decade. The yen slumps to a three-month low as a result. We hear from German finance minister Christian Lindner at the IMF annual meeting in Washington who says Europe must be prepared for a second Trump administration. Moody’s cuts its forecast for France to negative for worse-than-expected fiscal deterioration. The credit ratings agency also cast doubt over the current government’s ability to tackle...
Published 10/28/24
Tesla shares rocket by 21.9 percent – the company’s largest one-day gain in more than a decade – as U.S. markets hope to avoid their first negative week in six. The IMF warns that the growth gap between the EU and U.S. will only widen further. We hear from ECB board member and governor of the National Bank of Belgium, Pierre Wunsch, who says he would consider a 50 basis point rate cut should data move in the wrong direction. Japanese voters head to the polls this weekend with the ruling LDP...
Published 10/25/24
Tesla share surge in extended trade after the EV maker posted a better-than-expected earnings beat in Q3. CEO Elon Musk says the company’s sales targets of 20-30 per cent are achievable next year. The U.S. Treasury yield hits a three-month high and the dollar rallies as jitters over fiscal spending and the U.S. election surface. IMF First Deputy MD Gita Gopinath tells CNBC the macro environment is beginning to stabilise. South Korean semi-conductor supplier SK Hynix notches a record quarterly...
Published 10/24/24
The IMF hikes its U.S. forecast for 2024 but Germany weighs on the European outlook. The IMF’s Director of the Monetary and Capital Markets department, Tobias Adrian tells CNBC there are reasons for optimism. The S&P 500 suffers its first back-to-back session loss since September as investor attention turns to the dollar. Markets are now increasingly pricing in the outcome of a Trump victory in the U.S. election next month. Speaking to CNBC, IIF CEO Tim Adams believes the fight against...
Published 10/23/24
A late rally from Big Tech stocks pushes the Nasdaq to the brink of a fresh record high as earnings season begins in earnest. German computing giant SAP hikes its FY guidance following a top and bottom-line Q3 beat on the back of strong cloud revenues. Maersk raises its FY outlook for the fourth time this year. In autos news, monthly new car sales decline as demand for plug-in hybrid wanes, dropping more than 20 per cent across all major markets. Hyundai Motor India stock plunges 5 per cent...
Published 10/22/24
The PBOC cuts its benchmark lending rate to provide more support for the economy. The Shenzhen Composite moves higher as a result. In the U.S., Wall Street posts its longest streak of weekly gains so far this year on the back of lower rates and earnings optimism. Fitch confirms Italy’s credit rating and boosts its outlook to ‘positive’ in a sign the euro zone’s third largest economy is on the right track. And overnight in Lebanon, Israel targets Hezbollah-linked banks.
Published 10/21/24