Datastream Chart Blog

Tough times bring the British Euroskeptics in force, and with Prime Minister David Cameron now in their corner, their opposition to the proposed EU budget has at least some pundits wondering about the possibility of a “Brexit”. Europe is facing its own version of the fiscal cliff, with member countries having to agree on a [...]

The fiscal cliff looms large ahead; this week’s Chart of the Week tries to capture the numbers around which the political debate revolves. For several weeks to come, the outlook for financial markets – especially in the United States – is likely to revolve in large part around the question of whether the U.S. will [...]

Worried that the President’s re-election means higher market volatility? Other factors may prove more significant. Taken aback by the stock market’s volatility following the presidential election last week – and in particular, by the plunge on Wednesday, the single largest decline recorded by major market indexes? You probably shouldn’t have been, suggests this week’s chart [...]

October proved to be a tale of two market environments, as the benign, upbeat ‘risk on’ mood of early in the month gradually gave way to a growing degree of risk aversion and even fear by the final trading day of the month.: October came in like a lamb, with a third round of quantitative [...]

The junk bond, or high-yield bond, universe has seen yields decline steadily in both absolute and relative terms, creating a financing bonanza for companies whose credit rating is below investment grade and for the banks underwriting their debt issuance. But questions about corporate earnings may provoke questions about whether investors’ hunger for interest income has [...]

A glimpse into the past reveals some interesting starting points for (still more!) debate over who makes a better president in times of economic turmoil: a Republican or a Democrat. Last week’s final debate between President Barack Obama and his Republican Party challenger, former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney, although ostensibly devoted to foreign policy, developed [...]

Sentiment among U.S. homebuilders is on the rise, climbing even more rapidly than are the home sales that underpin that reviving confidence level. A lot of eyes are following the U.S. housing market, with last week’s announcement that existing home sales declined by 1.7% in September to an annual rate of 4.75 million units on [...]

Last year, China clamped down on exports of sought-after rare minerals and sent prices soaring. That action now is bringing new supplies on stream, just as demand has flattened up, causing a decline in prices that is nearly as dramatic. Rare earth elements simply aren’t as rare as they once were, it seems. An influx [...]

As the eurozone crisis keeps growing and spreading, even as central bankers and policymakers battle to contain it, anxiety is growing that the Dutch may be among the next to feel the full impact. The Netherlands may be famous for its vast network of dikes that keep the sea from flooding the country’s low-lying farmland [...]

With the help of central bankers and their increasingly aggressive attempts to stimulate growth and ward off crises, investors felt comfortable returning to invest in risk assets in September. But questions about the longer term outlook linger. Investors rediscovered their appetite for risk during September, the final month of the third quarter, but only with [...]