US has recently witnessed 13,000 layoffs in one day. Citigroup and BP have expected job cuts in the coming week. It has also been analyzed that over a period of 6 months, Britain will face over 600,000 job cuts, our source at Institute of Leadership and Management revealed. US stock markets have been hit hard by poor job market and a further decline in the sect0r. Recently Lloyds have laid off 650 employees and another 400 employees are expected to be laid off in the coming week. BAE factory closure also cost 260 jobs which has but skilled labours questioning their expertise.

June 2010 has seen only 10,000 graduate jobs in private sector which is not economic friendly. The jobs should be provided to individuals without job market laying off employees on the other hand. The jobs are available to companies with outsourcing license because many companies are laying off employees would rely on outsource. The unemployment is not expected to recover soon but it can be expected from government to take necessary measures to create employment and help the stock markets to recover which is also hit hard by the current economic situations.

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After the statement of President Obama, “We Will Make BP Pay” the grounds for BP is under heat since BP had to pay $20 billion funds quarterly to help clean sweep the oil spill. The shares market for BP has narrowed down and already witnessed a 18% loss which is likely to fall more in the near future as been predicted by analysts. Since the oil spill, BP has faced serious backlash from big oil rivals. The BP is now on hot seat as it has to face some serious criticism and future bailout plan if the BP shares crash. “The ball will never be in BP’s court” stated Kim Rogers, Financial Analyst of Financiere. The disaster was purely BP’s mistake since the CEO Tony Hayward apologized for the oil spill. The shareholders of BP should keep this in mind that they won’t be able to recover their losses in the near future and the best time to sell the shares is now when BP is somehow managing to show a 0.19% profits. After the fund allocation, the stock market may get affected by 3% in general but BP will face huge losses.

Shares Market Basics

If you are new to investments then it is worth your time to learn some basics of shares market before you take the risk. Business, in other term is known as risk. Most people are not comfortable with crashing shares market and thus they don’t invest or take the risk for investments thus losing an opportunity for great profits.

It is true that shares market has the most highly profitable returns sometimes profit exceeding 18% in six months. This rate of return is not even possible in banking and other financial institutions whereas property and gold assets are exceptional.

A share, in simple terminology, is owning one or more share of stocks in a company. A person owning shares is called shareholder. Shareholder has no interference in the company policies whatsoever but only plays a part of investor. The shareholder will be profited if the company excels and vice versa.

Types of Shares

There are two main types of shares namely Common and Preferred. Common shares represent the majority of stocks, ownership in a company and a claim on a portion of profits (dividends). The dividend amount alters and is not definite. In the long run, common shares yields greater amount of returns than most other investments.

On the other hand, preferred shares represent a degree of ownership in a firm or a company but usually doesn’t include voting rights whereas common shares has this advantage that shareholders can vote to elect the board members. With preferred stocks, shareholders are usually guaranteed a fixed dividend amount.

How to Buy Shares

Buying Shares is easier and faster than ever before, but unquestionably no less risky. If you’re a novice investor, you’ll want to organize yourself for the unpredictable markets before investing.  For detailed post on how to buy shares please click here

Why Shares Price Change

The price of shares in general is determined by demand and supply. If there are more buyers and fewer sellers, the shares price will rise. It’s only because the shares of that particular stocks are limited and people are willing to pay higher prices for them. Similarly if there are lots of shares of stock for sale and no buyers in market then the price of that particular share will drop. Because of these factors, the shares market fluctuates very often.

Anyone can get familiar with demand and supply concept. What is difficult to figure out is what makes people buy a particular stock and reject another. The price movement of shares indicates what investors feel about a company’s worth. It is not feasible to equate a company’s value from its shares price as it is not always an accurate indicator.

Bull Market

A bull market is when economy is booming and inflation and unemployment rate is low, allowing shares price rise. It is easy to buy shares during bullish market but not recommended because what goes around comes around. Same is the case with shares market, bullish market won’t last long.

Bear Market

A bear market occurs when the economy is under stress or inflation and recession is on the rise. Our financial advisory division recommends investors to purchase stocks at the time of extreme bearish market when the prices are very low, and stick with investments until the prices rise again. This is the best investment technique and the profits gained are tremendous.

India is the world’s largest gold-consuming nation. The share of gold in international market is 1.5X that of the U.S. although its GDP is only one-twentieth the size of the U.S. GDP. With its soaring rate of gold consumption, India accounts for 18% of the annual worldwide gold demand, while its share of global GDP on nominal dollar GDP is only 1.6%.

India is experiencing an 80% growth in gold investment following a relaxed trade and market limitations. The gold increased 242 per cent between March 1999 and March 2010 which is equivalent of an average annual return of 13.1 per cent and it also outpaced inflation which has increased by 30 per cent during the decade or by an average 2.7 per cent a year. Monetary authorities in India are not tremendously positive about the outlook of U.S. dollar thus their hedge against Dollar will help to set the stage for an alternative reserve currency/asset, an offer broadcasted by countries like China, France and Russia.

Despite the slump in the housing market in the past two years, property has produced the second highest return after Gold keeping PSU and BSE on third & forth respectively.

The decade of 2000 and especially the year 2007-08 saw a great boom in economic activity all over the world. And of course the leaders of this rat race were none other than the major holders of the international market i.e. America and some European states. This resulted in soaring prices of commodities, real estate and oil at breakneck speed. By mid 2008 prices went so high that it marked global inflation to historic levels. Domestic inflation reached 10-20 years high for many nations. Inflation also increased in developed countries but remained low as compared to the developing countries. This scenario caused the formation of economic bubbles largely consisting of the real estate bubbles all over the world.

GLOBAL RECESSION | Financiere.co.uk

Ironically and as predicted by many economists, especially in America, this booming economic activity resulted in the global financial recession. One of the major causes of the recession is the absence of a responsible role of states in the international financial market. There is always a huge risk of such recessions in non-government institutions like IMF, WTO and multi-national corporations rather than the states themselves controlling the global economy. The self-regulatory mechanism in markets, generally known as free market, is a utopia and not practicable in the long run. It might work for the economic leaders for a certain period of time, due to their leadership, but will ultimately fail as it failed for Asia, Africa & Latin America.

The global financial crises had been brewing up for a while, and it actually started to show its effects in mid 2007 and finally came out in the open after mid 2008. All around the world the real estate crashed and oil prices bulled, resulting in fall of stock markets and collapse of large financial institutions. Even the wealthiest nations had to come up with rescue packages and Bailout plans for their financial system. 300 banks were bankrupted only in United States due to the contemporary recession. In its repercussions, 10 banks were bankrupted in Europe. The story does not end up here, thanks to the trickle down effect, the global financial meltdown will effect everyone in this highly globalized world; from developed countries to developing and 3rd world countries.

The UK Stock market will be rough at the end of the year but in the month of March 2010, the stock market will rise benefiting the energy and beverages sector and the rise will continue till the month of May 2010. The month is not good for investments but it’s good to sell shares and earn profit because in the following months, the stocks would probably be at a nose-dive position due to job cuts and economic meltdown in the kingdom. In other words, the upcoming inflation would create difficulties in the stock market especially for middle-class traders. A game plan of selling shares in the mid of this year and buying shares at the end of this year when the market trembles would make investments to overflow 15% profit.

Gold is exclusive because it does not bring any credit risk. Gold is no one’s liability. There is no risk of non payments for a coupon or redemption for bonds and that a company will go out of business, as for equity. And dissimilar to a currency, the value of gold cannot be affected by the financial policies of the issuing country or destabilized by inflation in that country. A 24-hour trading, wide range of buyers – from the jewelry sector to financial institutions to manufacturers of industrial products – and a wide range of investment channels available, including coins and bars, jewelry, exchange-traded funds, certificates and structured products, makes the liquidity risk very minimal. The gold market is vast and profitable, because of the fact that gold can be traded at narrower spreads and more rapidly than many competing diversifiers or even mainstream investments.

Gold is subject to market risk but many of the risks associated with gold prices are very different from the risks associated with other assets, a factor which enhances gold’s charisma as safest and most secured investments. The specific risks, to which bonds and equities are exposed, including stress on the health of the government and corporate sector during an economic downturn, are not shared by gold.

Volatility is a type of measure for market risk. It measures the spreading of returns for a given security or market index. If an asset is volatile, risk increases. The gold price in general is less volatile than other commodity prices. This is because of the depth and liquidity of the gold market, which is sustained by the availability of large above-ground stocks of gold. Because gold is almost everlasting, nearly all of the gold which has ever been mined still exists. Unlike many other commodities such as, oil or platinum, the geographical diversity of modern mine production further reduces the chances of supply shocks from any specific country or region having an unnecessary impact on the price. As a result, gold is to some extent less volatile than heavily traded blue-chip stock market indices such as the FTSE 100 or the S&P 500.

Market of gold is very fascinating if one decides to start investing in it. It is very dynamic but the investments should be made for mid-term to long-term. Gold has proven to be an asset that has little connections with most financial assets, both in expansionary and recessionary periods. For gold, important fluctuation in the dollar exchange rate against the euro and yen are very important. The weaker the dollar is against these currencies, the more the value of metal rises. A similar situation exists with oil prices. With the increase of oil prices, investors begin to hedge the risk of inflation by buying gold. In mid-term and long-term, price of gold will rise because gold outperforms other assets such as stocks and bonds at times of high inflation as is currently the case, and can offer opportunities for impressive returns.

Our financial advisory division has warned that unemployment could rise steeply this year and has also forecasted a rise in unemployment upto 2.8 million. This is the longest period of recession since world war II. Millions of workers have felt the impact through growing unemployment, wage freezes and cuts, negative equity on houses and rising figures on house repossessions. Some of the biggest manufacturing companies in the UK have announced further job cuts in the month of February and March. Many sectors like auto manufacturing, auto parts, pharmaceutical, shopping malls, banks, garment retailers and even local authorities have announced job cuts. The total number of jobless people in UK is 2.5 million approx, which is around 8 percent of the population. The time has come for UK employees to understand that the average earnings rose at a record-low and the situation will keep on worsening till the third quarter of this year. The number of people claiming jobseeker’s allowance has now reached a record high and there are almost no new jobs in the market. The employers have raised the productivity and reduced labour costs leading to the toughest times in the history of UK.

The U.S. Fed (Federal Reserve Board) increased the discount rate charged to banks for direct loans whereas the chairman Ben Bernanke assured that the Fed and the central bank is aware of the joblessness in United States of America. It is said that the move will cheer financial institutions to rely more on money market treasuries rather than the state bank for liquidity requirements.
The dollar bulled as the Fed retreated gradually from its extraordinary actions to arrest the deepest financial crisis since the great depression. The Fed has released hundreds of billions of dollars in backstop credit to banks, commercial paper borrowers, bond dealers and anxious financial institutions. Our financial advisory division has stated the rise in discount rate as “nonsense” because of high inflation and joblessness. The U.S. economy hasn’t yet recovered completely from financial crises and the expenditure in Afghan and Iraq war is making the situation worst. The act of raising the discount rate is a fraction of a broader move to pull back the extraordinary aid fed provided to fight the financial crisis.