Category: Uncategorized

It looks like volatility is set to remain in the equity markets as traders (and algos) are constantly searching for news regarding geopolitical tensions in Eastern Europe.

Tensions Remain but Might Be Improving

During their Sunday phone call, Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky asked US Preident Joe Biden to visit Kyiv in person amid continuing White House claims that a Russian invasion is set to happen "any day" now.

Saying that major Ukrainian cities are "under safe protection," Zelensky suggested that a visit of the US president in person would stop the spread of panic and prevent escalation. 

"I am convinced that your visit to Kyiv in the coming days... would be a powerful signal and help stabilize the situation," Zelensky was quoted as saying in the call

Russian foreign minister Sergey Lavrov addressed the press alongside Russian President Vladimir Putin on Monday, easing investor nerves of an "imminent" invasion.

Initially, Lavrov said NATO is trying to dictate rules in Europe, and Russia is not satisfied with the US view on the alliance's expansion. He then added that Russia's proposals should be considered as a whole.

However, shortly after, Lavrov said he still supports continuing diplomatic talks with the west regarding whether "there was a chance for agreement" on critical issues. He can see a way to move forward with talks. To that proposal, Putin responded, "all right," sending all risk assets sharply higher.

Lastly, Ukraine's President Zelensky, in his Monday evening address to the nation, emphasized that the current crisis with Russia would be solved through negotiations. "Ukraine seeks peace and wants to deal with all issues only through negotiations."

Should the situation de-escalate, it might be a strong bullish signal for US equities.

Fed to Increase Rates in March

On the other hand, a de-escalation could confirm the current hawkish path of the Federal Reserve (Fed), with six rate hikes currently priced in. On Monday, St. Louis Fed's Jim Bullard reiterated his hawkish stance, saying the Fed must reassure people it will defend its inflation target (in the 2.0 – 2.5% range). Additionally, he said he is worried that the central bank is not moving fast enough. Therefore, he still supports a 50 bps rate hike in March.

Technically speaking, the next support for the SP500 index should be at previous lows in the 4,250/70 USD area. We might see a medium-term correction toward 4,000 USD if that level is broken down. 

Alternatively, the resistance is now seen at the 200-day moving average (the green line) near 4,465 USD. Jumping above would likely improve the short-term outlook to bullish.

Eightcap, a well-known global FX and CFD services provider based in Melbourne, Australia, has recently introduced an innovative tool for its clients: an economic calendar powered by AI. Developed in collaboration with Acuity, the calendar offers a comprehensive overview of more than 1000 macroeconomic events, sorted by their potential impact on the market. This tool aims to help traders manage market volatility triggered by economic events more efficiently and make good trading decisions.

The new economic calendar introduced by Eightcap differs from traditional calendars as it offers a range of unique features providing valuable insights into the market's reaction to economic events. Not only does it give an overview of upcoming macroeconomic events, but it also explains the reason behind the event's impact and how the market will react.

The CEO of Eightcap, Alex Howard, believes that the new AI-powered economic calendar will offer clients a powerful new tool to stay ahead of the fast-moving markets. He also emphasizes that Eightcap is committed to providing a wide range of tools and educational resources to enhance its clients' trading experience, enabling them to make smarter trading decisions.

With the new economic calendar, traders can leverage AI-powered advanced filtering to identify potential trading opportunities across 100+ countries and 1000+ macroeconomic events. The filtering technology utilizes bright and bold elements to highlight events with high, medium, and low-impact levels, helping traders prioritize their attention and focus on the most relevant events.

Andrew Lane, CEO of Acuity Trading, expressed enthusiasm for their partnership with Eightcap, a prominent online broker in the industry. He highlighted the potential to expand their reach and provide more traders with access to their powerful AI-based tools.

The new economic calendar will be available to all Eightcap clients and can be accessed via the Eightcap client portal. Additionally, traders can conveniently run the economic calendar as an EA tab on the MT4 or MT5 research terminal. This integration allows traders to access news, sentiment data, and other features within the same window, enhancing their user experience and enabling them to make more informed trading decisions.

About Eightcap

Eightcap is a top-tier derivatives provider established in Melbourne, Australia in 2009. The company offers its clients a diverse range of financial markets to trade on, including Forex, Indices, Shares, Commodities, and Cryptocurrency CFDs. Eightcap is authorized and regulated by several prominent financial regulatory bodies, including the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC), the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), the Cyprus Securities and Exchange Commission (CySEC), and the Securities Commission of The Bahamas (SCB).

The company is committed to providing its clients with the best possible trading experience and continually strives to improve its platform. The partnership with Acuity Trading is a testament to this commitment, as it enables Eightcap to offer cutting-edge tools and resources to its clients.

For more information about Eightcap or the economic calendar, please see here.

Dukascopy is now enhancing its trading opportunities by introducing two new indices to the MT4 platform. Investors with Dukascopy Bank and Dukasocpy Europe Live accounts and Demo users can take advantage of these freshly added instruments for their portfolios.

Dukascopy customers can add the Volatility Index (VOL.IDX) and the South Africa Top 40 Index (SOA.IDX) to their trading portfolio. Also, it had recently expanded the list of CFDs with 28 Stock CFDs from Mexico, the Volatiltity Index (VOL.IDX/USD) and the South Africa Index (SOA.IDX/ZAR) for users of the proprietary trading platform – Jforex.

Dukascopy is continuously advancing the capabilities of its premier JForex4 platform, offering traders access to an ever-growing selection of 1,160 assets. These tools span from popular Forex currency pairs and gold bullion all the way to cryptocurrencies, stocks & ETFs.

MT4 is a complimentary trading platform with a limited list of trading instruments. In the near future, Dukascopy plans to announce the MT5 trading platform launch.

The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) has announced the next steps to improve its Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS). The proposal to implement the changes was presented a year ago due to the rising concerns regarding increasing costs.

Financial services firms regulated in the UK must contribute to FSCS, which guarantees compensation if any authorized member of the industry becomes insolvent or cannot meet clients' claims. The compensation scheme aims to provide additional protection for retail investors and increase confidence.

However, the local financial services providers report rising concerns that compensation liabilities could be a barrier to new companies looking to enter the market and to smaller players who may struggle to stay in business. It might reduce the availability of certain financial services in the UK.

"We welcome the constructive engagement and feedback which will inform the next phase of this work. We want to make sure the cost to the industry for providing vital protection to consumers through the FSCS is distributed in a fair and sustainable way – that the polluter pays. We're continuing our assertive action to prevent harm from happening in the first place, which should help reduce the levy over time," Sheldon Mills, the Executive Director of Consumers and Competition at the FCA, said.

The FCA began reviewing the compensation framework in December 2021 and accepted comments from interested parties until March 2022. On 14 December 2022, the regulator published a feedback statement highlighting the need to improve the regulated firms' behaviour to reduce FSCS calls.

The regulatory watchdog has already taken action to address current concerns. In line with its investment strategy, the FCA is moving to a stricter approach to prevent potentially harmful companies from entering the market. The institution has also imposed twice as many restrictions on firms to block the sale of the riskiest financial products.

After reviewing and addressing the industry's feedback, the FCA's next phase of the FSCS review will analyze compensation limits and consider whether their level for particular types of claims is appropriate.

In addition, the regulator wants to survey firms and consumers to raise awareness of the compensation scheme's impact on investment decisions and traders' confidence. In the third step, the FCA will analyze funding class thresholds checking whether they remain at appropriate levels.

Admirals, a global financial tech provider, has taken its services to Kenya following the granting of their license from the Capital Markets Authority. As one of the first online forex trading brokers in East Africa, Admirals is poised to make waves across this vibrant and growing market.

“Admirals hopes the achieving of this license shall assist further growth in Africa and grant access to a stringently regulated market,” Admirals said in a statement.

The new license comes six months after South Africa’s Financial Sector Conduct Authority licensed Admirals SA (Pty) Limited to provide contracts for difference (CFD) execution and share trading options in South Africa. Additionally, Admirals Groups AS opened a new office in Cape Town as part of its move to expand its client base in Africa.

Meanwhile, in a statement on Thursday, the company noted that its Cypriot and South African subsidiaries had signed an agreement to jointly take over Aglobe Investments Limited.

Details on the company's site show that the firm is its subsidiary in Seychelles. Aglobe Investments Limited is regulated as a securities dealer by the Financial Services Authority of Seychelles.

Electronic trading major Interactive Brokers introduces PortfolioAnalyst Beta, now offering an intuitive dashboard with allocation, attribution, performance, risk metrics and more without the hassle of downloading PDF/CSV reports.

Users of the solution can view side-by-side summary statistics and drill down into details with historical periods, benchmark comparison, and frequency selection.

Interactive Brokers regularly expands the capabilities of PortfolioAnalyst, a solution that consolidates, tracks and analyzes one’s complete financial performance.

The solution now supports custom Time Periods and Cumulative Performance Statistics reports. When selecting Time Period and/or Cumulative Performance Statistics you will be asked to Include Long and Short Breakout Yes|No on the next page.

In addition, there are new crypto connections for external accounts. Coinbase, Kraken and Gemini connections are now available to link in PortfolioAnalyst.

Finally, Interactive Brokers now offers PortfolioAnalyst for all paper accounts. Traders can test trading strategies, generate performance on prospective client portfolios and experience Interactive Brokers’ robust platform before opening an account.