Die von Russland mit Krieg überzogene Ukraine braucht neue kampfstarke Truppen. Doch bei deren Aufbau läuft nach Angaben von Beobachtern einiges schief. Es gebe viele Fälle von Fahnenflucht.
Wurde die Zahlung aus einer Sterbegeldversicherung an den Bestatter abgetreten, können Erben trotzdem Beerdigungskosten in voller Höhe von der Steuer absetzen, entschied der BFH.
Die EZB hat 2024 viermal die Zinsen gesenkt, zuletzt im Dezember um 0,25 Prozent. Tendenziell sorgt das für günstigere Kredite. Dennoch verlor die Kreditvergabe an Schwung.
Besser als US-Konkurrenten wie Hewlett-Packard oder IBM? Der deutsche IT-Spezialist Saytec sieht sich technologisch vorn – und hat auch Nachrichtendienste als Kunden.The clock has turned on the foreign exchange market and we’re onto the new charts. Here are the final closing levels for 2024 for the major pairs
Here is a chart showing the annual changes, though it’s not the prettiest chart because the US dollar could be on either side of the equation. There also might be some slight misses here as I have NZD fractionally ahead of JPY, meaning that the yen was the worst performer in 2024.
The US dollar was the winner.
Bitcoin finishes the year at $95,538.
The top performer on the Nasdaq 100 was Applovin, followed (distantly) by Microstrategy, Palantir and Nvidia. Palantir was tops in the S&P 500 with Vistra in second place. The top DJIA component was Nvidia but it was only added in November, it was followed by Walmart with an impressive 72% gain.
This article was written by Adam Button at www.forexlive.com.
On the day:
On the month:
The Russell 2000 was a big post-election Trump trade that soured quickly on tariff worries.
On the year:
The two-year return of the S&P 500 is the best since 1997-98.
The underperformance of the Russell 2000 is notable and I think there needs to be some real broadening to keep the bull market going in 2025. The good news is that the weekly Russell 2000 chart is showing a series of higher lows. If Trump cools it on the tariff talk and Congress extends the Trump tax cut (or improves it) then it could be the trade of 2025.
Meanwhile, here are annual returns for the Nasdaq for the past 30 years:
As for the Nasdaq, the big question for 2025 is whether it’s a redux of 1998 or a redux of 2000. The impressive performance of China’s DeepSeek raises some questions about the need for semi-conductors.
This article was written by Adam Button at www.forexlive.com.
This year, the US dollar took an 11.6% bite out of both.
It certainly wasn’t a straight line for anyone trading the pair. NZD steadily rose against JPY from May to mid-July and then the bottom fell out as the market sniffed out a global slowdown. It was a rug pull in the pair that led to some breathtaking selling for three straight weeks. That drop was an early warning sign that foreshadowed (by about a week) a drop in US equities and global risk assets.
But the economic pain never really materialized in a way that some central bank rate cuts couldn’t handle. The Fed pivoted and NZD/JPY has cautiously tried to find a bottom.
Mixed in with that has been a haphazard Chinese stimulus program that’s at times inspired the market but mostly disappointed it. That will remain a big theme in NZD/JPY and trading in general in 2025.
This article was written by Adam Button at www.forexlive.com.