Panic ,You aint seen nothing yet. ……..Buy Baked Beans and Gold

What a week eh. Firstly the Euro collapsed closely followed by equity markets.

The EUR/USD was sold off to a 4 year low of 1.2143 on a wave of selling following a announcements from Germany of a ban on naked short selling of bonds. This was seen as a panic measure.
However, the relief of the German government agreeing to the recent bail out package ( all be it by 7 votes) and a bout of intervention by the Swiss Central Bank helped the Euro back to 1.26 plus.
Equity markets which were largely in free fall may have some respite next week in response to Fridays rally in the US.
Volatility surged everywhere with Gold reacting sharply from its recent highs and the Ausie Dollar losing some 6% plus against the US dollar over 7% against the Euro and 9% against the Yen.

So where do we go to? My instinct tells be the heat may be off next week but that may require further consolidation from the equity markets and Euro.
Further out Investors ,hedge funds and other speculators from around the globe seem unconvinced on the Euro and at the very least the growth outlook for Europe as a whole.The dreaded double dip recession is now being predicted in some quarters.

It feels like only a matter of time before we see another bout of Euro selling. Judging by the fall out with Germany over their announcements regarding short selling there seems no real consensus from the politicians who frankly have no idea where this will end. That said , you should not underestimate the political resolve to keep the Euro ideal.

It is a funny old world when less than 6 months ago you could still find articles relating to the Euro taking over from the US Dollar as a reserve currency.

Sterling was largely sidelined but of note it has made very little headway against a much weaker Euro thus far.

Technically the Euro may have formed a short term base but remains for the time being firmly in a downtrend.

And Baked Beans? Well Henz shares been stable at around $47 for the last month (yes, stable) but they were sitting at 36 bucks a year ago. That´s a 25% increase year on year- beats putting your money in the bank by a long shot.