Daily Snapshot

So go on then, it isn’t the parallel bars or the pommel horse, probably not the marathon or the pole vault and definitely not the Golf – So based on a YouGov Poll ‘if started training today, what do 27% of Brits think they could qualify for the 2028 Olympics in? I was asked this last week and went with Rowing or Beach Volleyball but admit my competitive sport years are well and truly behind me. What currently seems behind us is the notion of a resilient and spending U.S. Consumer which dominate…

Well it felt like we were trundling down a narrow creek for the earlier part of today’s session, trickling along off early lows, with volumes light ahead of the latest weekly US jobs data which is normally nothing to write home about but felt firmly in the spotlight today as angst continued to linger following last week’s soft NFP number. Further publications around a US recession this morning did little to quell fears, with yesterday’s bounce feeling largely in the rear-view mirror.. that is,…

Right that is it….the world has gone mad…it is nigh on impossible to open a joint bank account. Impossible to do online. “Head to a branch” they say…well there isn’t a single one open in central London, and at my local one “Opening hours are 9-4”…Brilliant! I got absolutely nowhere with that then but it was encouraging to see the Banks leading the way today in Europe (clearly not for their new customer acquisition skills). For Europe to do well, banks need to do well and although the macro head…

Anyone else feeling a bit short changed this morning by the bounce that was looking so promising at 7am? There are LOTS of moving parts at the moment which could go a long way to explain the jitters: Geopolitical instability, Yen Carry trade implications, U.S Economic jitters, Mega cap tech wobbles, political instability/elections, seasonality…. The list goes on…. The bounce in Europe turned out to be short lived and turned into a fall at one stage, by no means what we’ve been used to the past…

It’s August, the third session and it’s already been a long month. Lots of people are away and there was no real need/desire to be a hero and that was fairly evident today from the offset. Walking into the Nikkei -12% doesn’t happen very often, not for 37 years as it happens and within the Japanese markets the real culprit emerged once again: The Yen. It strengthened by as much as 3% today, by 8% in the last 5 days and actually is near parity for the year vs the Dollar. The Carry Trade that has…

First the ECB, now the BOE…. are Powell and the Fed behind the curve here? Who knows but the BOE decision today was a coin toss but they decided to cut rates, split 5:4 in terms of votes showing just how finely balanced this decision was. On services inflation the MPC view is that, excluding volatile and indexed prices, service inflation is lower than the headline rate suggest. The market was quick to price in a further 2x cuts this year here in the UK though we do not expect any further easing…

A Microsoft miss did nothing to dissuade Europe from having a relatively good midweek rally. It wasn’t really a big miss, and it rallied all the way through the post-market and pre market which helped but all focus was on a raft of European names that managed to report reasonable sets. JDE Peet’s, Teleperformance, Just Eat Takeaway, Airbus, HSBC, Danone, Legrand and Schneider – the list goes on. A decent print from AMD softened some of the fears around the Semi-conductor space too and we were b…

Off to dinner tonight at somewhere that has claims to be ‘London’s Largest Private Terrace’ which is just as well given the weather! Factor 50 applied early because I’ve learnt that lesson one too many times. Other things I’ve learnt over the years is don’t book the last flight home on a Sunday and one for the road is never a good idea (especially on a Tuesday). 9pm this evening not a time for a Whisky but instead time to check the Bloomberg and see what Microsoft, the $3trn beast has said to t…

Tarte Tartin on the menu yesterday as I decided to pull myself away from the Olympics for a couple hours and make some use of myself. It has to be one of the best deserts (and I didn’t mess it up thankfully): not too heavy, quite sweet, and once I got it unstuck from the pan, a real treat! It was a lovely way to set myself up for the week ahead which has a full array of treats in store: Megacap Tech earnings from Amazon, Apple, Meta, Microsoft clearly on peoples minds, Central Bank meetings fr…

*And… Breathe!* Well – there you have it , the busiest day of corporate earnings behind us here in Europe as over 110 companies took to the stand earlier. It was easy to feel like you were caught in the whitewater with results flooding the tape and there was little time for investors to surface for air as some unforgiving single-stock moves drove sentiment firmly to the floor as the Q2 results picture continues to be murky. Pain was exacerbated in French equities, with the CAC 40 (-1.15%) makin…