Week 49 2010 weekend

Here are some issues that happened during this weekend, which might affect tomorrow’s trading:

There was an apparent terrorist attack in central Stockholm by what appears to be a suicide bomber. According to Swedish news agency TT it and the Swedish Security Service Säpo were tipped 10 minutes in advance about an impending revenge relating to Swedish military presence in Afghanistan and to the drawings of the Islamic prophet Muhammad by artist Lars Vilk. The bomb was designed to create widespread damage but only the presumed suicide bomber was killed.

Fortum published a press release on Sunday that it has agreed to divest heat production operations and facilities outside of Stockholm to global investment banking and financial services group Macquarie for around 200 million Euro pending official approval.

The 2010 United Nations Climate Change Conference in Cancun Mexico managed to spin things in a way that was reported to be a major step forward. The final ”agreement” suggests rich countries to cut greenhouse gas emission and for developing countries to start planning for doing so. Additionally there is a rather large proposed fund to assist poor countries in cutting emissions. Whilst the outcome is non-binding and watered down, the expectations before the end of the meeting were that pretty much zero common ground would be reached. In the festive mood after the meeting, there were resolute calls to push the agreement into a binding treaty in the ensuing meetings.

The widely speculated interest rate hike did not come about in China just yet but The Central Economic Work Conference cited a shift to a more prudent monetary policy. They wish to drive the inflation expectations lower, saying among other things that stabilizing price levels will be given a more prominent position. Via the usual for them gradual manner interest rate hikes will follow eventually. The headline number for Inflation Rate in China printed at 5.1% on Saturday.