Last Thursday the Federal Reserve decided to keep its short-term interest rates unchanged, a decision that saw a steep decline in the U.S. stock market. Although the prolonged period of expansionary monetary policy has greatly contributed to the recovering U.S. economy, investors interpreted the decision as a sign that the U.S. is still weak and vulnerable to international economic influences such as the devaluation of the Chinese currency. The decision has greatly contributed to the overall market uncertainly and the sentiment is now strongly positioned towards the interest rates not being raised until 2016.

Read The Full Story Here.

Financial markets experienced an awful start to the week, with no asset classes spared. The S&P 500 plunged 5% at open, finishing 11% below the May high. European stocks fell by 5%, the most since 2008. Commodities sharply slid to a 16-year low with Brent crude trading below $45 USD.

Most selling has been attributed to the slowdown of growth in China which is seen in the devaluation of the Yuan and the continued decline of Chinese equities. It remains to be seen how poor upcoming Chinese economic data is and how far the market will fall.

Read the full article here

At the beginning of the year many market experts expected gold to increase in value given the uncertainty in Europe and China. However, as always gold moves inversely with the state of the US economy. The continued growth of the US economy coupled with the possibility of Federal reserve rising interest rates has seen gold (XAU) decline to its lowest levels in six years. Now Deutsche bank predicts that the fair value of gold is $750 (currently trading at $1100) with only falling oil prices providing support to its price. It remains to be seen just how low the gold price can go.

Find out all the reasons for Deutsche's prediction by reading the full article here. 

The Shanghai Composite Index more than doubled since last year, driven by anticipation of growing economy, over-use of margin lending, and the heavy government support. However, it was irrational to expect the market to continue endlessly moving especially with mind blowing valuations compared by many to those during the dot-com bubble. As the market began to slide the Chinese retail investors that make up the majority of the traded volume began to exit in anticipation of further declines, unwinding heavily leveraged positions in the process. Even though the Chinese government massively interfered to boost the prices, the market fell by more than 30% in the space of one month. The recent slowdown in the Chinese economy creates a clear question: has China's stock market euphoria ended?

Click here to read the full article.

Since problems first arose post the GFC, the Greek bail-out saga has provided seductive opportunities for contrarian investors with their high appetites for risk. However, they are now faced with their biggest dilemma yet. On one hand, the returns of some heavily undervalued assets could deliver an opportunity of a life time. On the other, the possibility of Greece exiting the euro zone is seeming ever more likely, and so too the possibility of these contrarian investments being wiped out through government default.

The continuing argument has revolved around the effect of a Greek exit. Those in Greece's corner argue that the euro-zone will be worse off if Greece's peers eject it than continuing to bail Greece out, however some optimists argue that a possible exit will be better absorbed by the euro zone now than when it was first proposed in 2011.

The article below provides an in depth overview of the Greek situation and its influence on Europe.

Click here to read the full article.