Archive for the ‘Statistics’ Category

Mercer’s Cost of Living Survey for 2011 is now live, and the result might surprise some of you. It’s not London, New York or Tokyo that’s most expensive to live in for expatriates, rather an African city – Luanda in Angola.

Photo above: Credit to Yukiba.com

However, Tokyo comes in as the 2nd most expensive city to live, while N’Djamena in Chad turns out (more…)

The British pound also experienced increased resistance on Monday after the first quarter of UK economic data was worse than previously expected. There are many indications now that the recession been worse than expected and economic growth lower then earlier estimated.

UK inflation way over target level

The country’s inflation in recent months is now 3.7%, significantly above the Bank of Englands target level of 2%. Britain could be forced to raise interest rates relatively soon, as MPC member Andrew Sentance already voted for. But Mr. Archer at the Bank of England believes inflation is on a downward trend and believe rates will be kept at 0.5% throughout 2010 and well into in 2011. How credible is the new government and how well will they keep Britain’s a currency? If the BOE will not to curb inflation in the near future you can expect the British pound to decrease significantly.

When do you think Britain will raise interest rates?

Vladimir Putin seek to cut the percentage of foreign currency loans more then 50 %. He imposed new tax breaks with reductions for local loans compared to foreign loans.

Russian Debt levels

Russian companies have $294 billion of international and 12.8 trillion rubles ($410.8 billion) of local loans, according to Bank of Russia.

Lower inflation and borrowing costs

The interest rate has been cut 14 times in Russia the last year, to 7.75 % in July. At the same time, inflation gone down drastically from over 10 % to 5.8 % in June. (more…)

Swedish Riksbanken speech insisted that Sweden’s rate is planned to remain flat until autumn 2010. Ingves pointed out the risk of a potential real estate bubble if the current interest rate levels remains for a long period.

He continues: “We believe that interest rates will be significantly higher in a few years from now”. In 2011, the interest rates will probably go up sharply, from less than 1% to 3%. At least if we are to believe the current forecast from the Swedish Riksbank.

Why was the Swedish interest rates unchanged?

Everything indicates that the recovery in the economy continues, while inflation pressures continue to be low.

With the Riksbank’s inflation target of 2 percent and to simultaneously support the economic recovery of the Riksbank decided to leave the repo rate unchanged at 0.25 percent. (more…)

Forex Traders are worried Fridays release of the US unemployment rate was way worse then expected and now the US Dollar might face further decrease.

American Labor Department reported that the much higher unemployment rate could be due to lagging data. The non-farm payroll employment fell by 216 000 jobs in August, followed by a revised decrease of 276 000 jobs in July. The new numbers are indication that America is now facing a 9.7 % unemployment rate, the highest in 26 years. Financial analysts and currency traders did expect a 9.4 % unemployment rate in July.

Further pressure on US Dollar

However, it seems like the decrease have moderated the last months, even if some sectors still face continued job losses. Still, consumer confident might be lagging in the coming months. As a result of the unexpected numbers from USA, many online forex traders assume that the US Dollar will continue to suffer against the Euro and Yen.