Visa, which accounts for a third of credit card spending in the UK, reports that sales volume slipped by 1 per cent in December (first drop in this month in 5 years) as compared to this time last year and follows a 0.9 per cent drop in November; this means that over the calendar year sales fell by 0.3 per cent, the first annual fall since 2012. One shouldn’t be surprised seeing as wage growth hasn’t kept up with inflation.
LCH, the clearing arm of the London Stock Exchange, reports that in 2017 a record number of derivative contracts were processed, interest rate products alone worth a notional $873 trillion, up 31 per cent over the previous year and its foreign exchange arm another $11 trillion. It clears 90 per cent of global interest rate swaps.
DAX 30
The biggest weekly (just 4 working days) rally since early May despite Mrs Merkel struggling to form a government in Germany for a third consecutive month. Mind you, Northern Ireland hasn’t had one in a year and Barcelona’s top separatists are imprisoned in Madrid.
SHORT TERM TRADER: Square.
POSITION TAKER: Square.
FTSE 100
Settling at a new record weekly high.
SHORT TERM TRADER: Square.
POSITION TAKER: Long at 7681; stop below 7600. Target 8000.
S&P 500
Pushing well ahead of an already very steep trend line so that it’s ludicrously overbought again on the RSI.
SHORT TERM TRADER: Square.
POSITION TAKER: Square.
BRITISH POUND/US DOLLAR
Nice and steady with bullish momentum as we cautiously probe a sort of pre and post-referendum watershed level around 1.3600.
SHORT TERM TRADER: Long at 1.3540; stop below 1.3470. First target 1.3800.
POSITION TAKER: Still square and looking to go long.
EURO/US DOLLAR
Bullish momentum is not all it might be and explains the struggle with last year’s high at the psychological 1.2000.
SHORT TERM TRADER: Small long at 1.2035; stop below 1.1935. Target 1.2185.
POSITION TAKER: Square.
GOLD
Three solid consecutive weekly rallies yet bullish momentum just isn’t there.
SHORT TERM TRADER: Short at 1314; stop above 1335. Target 1270.
POSITION TAKER: Square.
Nicole Elliott is a long-standing Member of the Society of Technical Analysts and has taken over the IC’s trading coverage. She is regularly interviewed and quoted by the financial media, is a conference speaker, and author of several books on charting.
