Hi Everybody,
Would like to wish all of our clients and colleagues in and from Ireland a very happy St. Patrick’s day. May the luck of the Irish guide you in your trading and in everything else. 😀
-Mati
Today’s Highlights
- G20 & Trump Merkel
- Ether 50!!
Please note: All data, figures & graphs below are valid as of March 17th. All trading carries risk. Only risk capital you’re prepared to lose.
Market Overview
Now that the Fed and other Central Banks have made their respective plays, focus shifts back to politics. Leaders of the world’s 20 biggest economies will meet today and tomorrow in Germany.
Meanwhile, German Chancellor Angela Merkel will be visiting Donald Trump in Washington.
Trump’s Treasury Secretary, Steve Mnuchin, will be representing the US in Germany with a goal of wooing his counterpart Wolfgang Schauble, the German Finance Minister.
So, while Steve and Wolfgang do their best to play nice at the kiddie table, Trump and Merkel will be over at the adult table trying to conduct some business. Both heads of state have criticized each other publicly in the past but both are smooth operators who should be able to put personal feelings aside for the good of their respective countries.
Watch headlines closely, if anything should go sour at either venue the markets will react swiftly.
Investors have been incredibly optimistic over the past few months about Trump’s intention to lower taxes. However, as we learned from OPEC and the price of Crude Oil, words can only carry the market for so long and even action, if not strong enough, can at times be insufficient.
The budget proposed yesterday certainly didn’t seem very business friendly as it diverted funds from many different government programs, including ones that feed the hungry, towards military purposes.
Stocks on Wall Street ended flat yesterday and today’s Asian session is not looking very optimistic. The US Dollar is also under pressure ever since the rate rise.
Ethereum on Fire
Either using smart contracts or not, it looks like Ethereum has caught a Leprechaun and convinced it to give up the gold.
I made a video for people who are new to cryptotrading and would like to get into it. You can find it here: https://youtu.be/wdAU9CoM_vI
Let me know what you think.
The world’s second largest cryptocurrency surpassed $50 a coin in overnight trading before pulling back.
The total amount of value of all Ether tokens in the world now stands at close to $4 Billion, compared to Bitcoin’s market cap of more than $18 Billion.
Recently, cryptocurrency enthusiasts like @Jaynemesis have been pointing out that there are some serious scalability issues with Bitcoin. Meaning, that going forward it may become more expensive and take longer to process a transaction unless they upgrade the network, which is not an easy task.
Meanwhile, the Ethereum blockchain is already ahead of that issue and already thinking seriously about its next upgrade to the Casper system.
Here we can see a chart of Ether (white) against Bitcoin (red) since the beginning of the month.
Earlier today @BigFish posted this article on his wall talking about how we could conceivably see cars that run on Ethereum in the not too distant future.
Trade with others. Join eToro community and use experience of other traders!
Whatever the reason for the surge, the momentum is incredible, and for those who enjoy a fast paced market, this is as good as it gets.
As always, feel free to contact me directly with any questions by Email or on my wall @MatiGreenspan.
Have an amazing weekend!
Best regards,
Mati Greenspan
Senior Market Analyst
