Market Snapshot – Equity Markets Await the Fed, Litecoin Surges 45%

European Stock Markets Soft

The German ZEW economic sentiment data was released and it came it softer than expected. This led to some weakness in the DAX index which dominated the rest of the European stock markets which continued to see some subdued trading. These stock markets are under the pressure from the Brexit process which has not shown much progress over the last couple of days and it remains to be seen whether any breakthrough deal, in terms of trading access, would be announced by the end of the year. Till that time, expect some consolidation and ranging in the stock markets as the traders await the central banks later in the week with all 3 major central banks scheduled to make announcements before they go off for the end of the year.

Gold Prices Weak

Equities around the world continue to be soft as the traders look forward to the Fed rate announcement and statement that is coming in tomorrow. The market expects the Fed to hike rates tomorrow and also provide some hawkish guidance regarding the next rate hikes in 2018. If any of these fails to happen, then the markets are likely to be hit by bearishness as the market has already priced in the rate hike tomorrow. Gold continues to weaken in anticipation of strength from the dollar and also due to the fact that some of the funds are being pulled out of gold and invested into bitcoin.

Litecoin Hits All-Time High

The biggest story of the day so far is the moves made by Litecoin, which has surged to $320.42 at the time of writing, up 45.93% on the day.

This week, the Litecoin community decided to step into the limelight and take a more vocal stance on Bitcoin’s shortcomings, following news of more than 230,000 transactions being log jammed on exchanges at the start of the week. The decision to take advantage of Bitcoin’s woes certainly paid off, with Litecoin surging in excess of 60% this week.