Your Weekly Trading Review by UFX.com – Sunday, November 19th, 2017
This week’s major financial market news and events:
The EUR/USD rose by +0.17%, closing at $1.1790, while the GBP/USD increased by +0.15%, closing at £1.3215. Gold and Crude Oil enjoyed increased performance this week. Gold went up by +1.43%, closing at $1,296.50, while Crude Oil rose by +1.41%, closing at $62.72 a barrel.
The Dow ended down by -0.43%, closing at 23,358.24. The S&P 500 fell by -0.26%, closing at 2,578.85. The NASDAQ had a slight drop of -0.15%, ending at 6,782.79.
Volkswagen Joins the Electric Car Manufacturing Game
Volkswagen plans to invest $12 billion in electric and hybrid car manufacturing, Since China remains the largest electric car market – at approximately 50% usage of the world’s environmentally-friendly vehicles – VW intends to enter the Chinese market first. In its press release, the company announced plans to manufacture 40 new models from now and through 2025. The first of these new models could be released as soon as 2018.
According to Herbert Diess, Chairman of the Board of Volkswagen, the massive investment will give a significant push to the largest product and technology campaign in the history of the brand. The German car maker has been suffering from costly staff and development expenses in the hopes of of recovering from a diesel emissions scandal that has negatively impacted the famous automaker.
Bill Gates $80 Million Smart City Plans
Microsoft Co-Founder and famous philanthropist, Bill Gates, announced plans to build a smart city. His investment firm, Belmont Partners, recently purchased 25,000 acres in Arizona. The firm intends to develop a community with a population of about 182,000. The smart city will be named Belmont and is set to build 80,000 residences, 3,800 acres of office, retail, and commercial space, and 470 acres for the construction of public schools.
Belmont Partners noted that they plan to “create a forward-thinking community with a communication and infrastructure spine that embraces cutting-edge technology, designed around high-speed digital networks, data centers, new manufacturing technologies and distribution models, autonomous vehicles and autonomous logistics hubs.”
That’s our summary of the financial headlines from the past week. Good luck with this week’s trading and stay tuned for the next review from UFX.