Last shorter trading week brought nice gains for most of global stock market indices. US major benchmarks closed sharply higher during 3,5 trading days. Dow Jones up 9,73% Nasdaq Composite 10,92% and Samp;P 500 12,03%. There have not been any fundamental improvement but the markets were just deeply oversold and bargain hunters started to add new positions.br /br /Recently I have published ETF performance map on year to date basis. Numbers were oscillating around -50% for a style="font-weight: bold;" href="http://stockweb.blogspot.com/2008/10/state-of-market-european-etf.html"European ETF/a and -60% for a style="font-weight: bold;" href="http://stockweb.blogspot.com/2008/10/state-of-market-asian-etfs.html"Asian ETF/a except Japan. I think it will be interesting to see which markets benefit from last week rally the most.br /br /br /a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_28p7XDn4Qb0/STFZU8vo6qI/AAAAAAAABUw/d46RNdGkn44/s1600-h/european+ETF.jpg"img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 380px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_28p7XDn4Qb0/STFZU8vo6qI/AAAAAAAABUw/d46RNdGkn44/s400/european+ETF.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5274094855065758370" border="0" //abr /As seen on picture the leader was iShares MSCI Turkey (TUR) with enormous 40% in ...

strongFinancial News /strongbr /br /By Jason Corcoranbr /br /24 November 2008 br /br /emLetter from Moscow/embr /Gambling in casinos has been a popular pastime in Moscow since the fall of communism but a more recent fad is desperate speculation on the currency markets. A slide in the value of the rouble and a deposit run at banks that is gathering momentum has loaded the dice in favour of a punt on the dollar.br /br /The on-off love affair with the greenback dates back to 1998 when a rouble devaluation wiped out people’s savings. Those lucky enough to have withdrawn their money in time transferred funds into dollars. br /br /Popular as Russia’s leaders are, its citizens have learnt not to take any chances by keeping faith with the rouble. Russians are rushing to protect their wealth in global currencies, having seen the stock market plunge by 70%, inflation hovering at ...

Austria is justifiably famous for its banking system—particularly for its bank secrecy law, which has the same legal status as the Austrian Constitution. But while Austrians take their financial privacy very seriously, there’s another aspect of Austria that doesn’t get as much attention: residence. With its world-class opera, museums, and galleries, Austria is truly one of the world’s most civilized countries. Vienna, its capital, is a cultural treasure. Indeed, Mercer’s, a major human resources consultancy ranks Vienna as the second most desirable city to live in the world (behind Zurich)—and Vienna is much more affordable. And within an hour’s drive of Vienna, you can visit three different countries: the Czech Republic, Hungary, and Slovakia. Austria is also a popular haven for English-speaking expatriates. While you won’t find the concentrations of U.S. expatriates that you would in places like Costa Rica, Panama, or London, you’ll find a high quality of life and reasonable ...

by Edward Hugh: BarcelonaItaly, which is still the eurozone's third biggest economy, slipped into a recession in the third quarter. The Italian economy fell into what is now its fourth recession in less than a decade as gross domestic product shrank 0.5 percent from its level in the second quarter, when it contracted a revised 0.4 percent, the national statistics office said today. This is already Italy's worst recession since 1992, and there is evidently more and worse to come.Italy effectively followed Germany, Europe's largest economy, in posting two consecutive quarters of contraction -- the technical definition of a recession. Spain contracted on the quarter, while France narrowly avoided recession by posting a slender 0.1% expansion after contracting in the second quarter.From the third quarter of 2007 the economy contracted 0.9 percent, and this was the sharpest ...

As every woman who has ever had dealings with a man knows only too well, it is a lot easier for people to make promises than it is for them to keep them. And when Europe's leaders met in Paris on the 12 October, a lot of fine promises (which were all, surely, very well intentioned) were made. The reality of having to live up to them, however, is turning out, as might only have been expected, to be much more complicated.Basically, the kernel of the plan which is now being operationalised seems to have been thrashed out in Washington on 11 October, when key G7 leaders met with Dominique Strauss Kahn of the IMF, and it was decided to try and erect two great firewalls (corta fuegos) - at least as far as Europe is concerned. One of these was to be co-ordinated by the EU governments, ...

A very cool, very clever black man overcomes racism and ignorance to triumph over his detractors thanks to superior intellect and a methodical nature. No, not the Presidential election, but the plot of the multiple Oscar winning movie 'In the Heat of the Night', which was released over 40 years ago but resonates today on the cusp of a generational political shift in US politics. Having watched it again at the weekend, and amid the endless stream of apocalyptic economic comment (I'm a longtime fan of NYU economist Nouriel Roubini, but he's becoming the Henry Blodget of the bear case, and we all know how that ended), Americans can feel justifiably proud that in a generation we have got to this point. It looks increasingly likely that the Democrats will seize not only the White House, but a filibuster proof majority in the Senate as well, ...

Look at this picture. It is 12 months performance map for European Exchange Traded funds. Not surprise it is deep red color. The worst performers are Belgium iShares (EWK) with almost 70% down followed by Austria iShares (EWO) with -66%. Austria "gate to Central and Eastern Europe" has been under selling pressure especially in last weeks when big hit came to the markets like Hungary, Czech Republic or Poland. Relative winner seems to be iShares Switzerland (EWL) which is down 37%. Swiss ETF benefited mainly due to positive trend of Swiss franc vs. Euro. But generally we can conclude than the whole European Union ETF world is down more than 50%. For comparison, US funds are with far better performance. S&P (SPY) -41%, iShares Dow Jones (IYY) -40% and PowerShares QQQ (QQQQ) -44%.http://stockweb.blogspot.com/atom.xml

by Edward Hugh: Barcelona Hungarian Prime Minister Ferenc Gyurcsány announced yesterday (Wednesday) that the government had reached an agreement with commercial banks intended to protect the interests of those who have taken out foreign currency loans. The agreement, which is expected to be signed early next week, has three key components: 1) At the request of the debtor the banks will allow the duration of the loan to be extended (with fixed monthly instalments) so that the depreciation of the forint “does not place an unbearable burden on the debtors". 2) FX debtors who deem that exchange rate fluctuations carry excessive risks for them will be allowed to convert their foreign currency-based loan to a forint loan. In this case the banks “will accept this request and make the switch without extra charges". 3) If a debtor finds him- or herself in a position where he or she cannot pay the monthly instalments, e.g. due ...

Hungarian Prime Minister Ferenc Gyurcsány announced this morning (Wednesday) that the government had reached an agreement with commercial banks intended to protect the interests of those who have taken out foreign currency loans.The agreement, which is expected to be signed early next week, has three key components:1) At the request of the debtor the banks will allow the duration of the loan to be extended (with fixed monthly instalments) so that the depreciation of the forint “does not place an unbearable burden on the debtors".2) FX debtors who deem that exchange rate fluctuations carry excessive risks for them will be allowed to convert their foreign currency-based loan to a forint loan. In this case the banks “will accept this request and make the switch without extra charges".3) If a debtor finds him- or herself in a position where he or she cannot ...

While investors remain extremely concerned about the volatility of the U.S. stock market, the weakness of the American economy and the uncertainty of the global financial markets, last week brought “slight” relief from the excessive panic of the eight-trading-session losing streak.

Bear in mind that each new economic report, earnings statement, news report or trading session represents a new opportunity for fear and uncertainty to reemerge.

Fortunately, next week’s economic calendar remains quite light, although retailers may just weigh in with “doom-and-gloom” holiday predictions.  Earnings season may be weak as well (with even more pessimistic outlooks), so investors should not overreact even if Texas Instruments Inc. (TXN), Halliburton Inc. (HAL), Amazon.com Inc. (AMZN) and others fail to meet expectations.  Volatility should continue and the days of triple-digit index moves (often up and down in the same day) may be here for a while.

So try not to get so overwhelmed with the

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