During the first weeks of the new year, western markets were quiet. Indices of the leading western trading platforms mainly stayed flat. Traders and investors have continued to return from new year holidays to take challenges of the new year. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) is getting ready to upgrade the forecast for global economic growth. In December, IMF Managing Director Christine Lagarde stated that IMF’s experts became “much more confident” in prospects for the American economy in 2014. The IMF’s current forecast expects growth of the global economy at 3.6% during the current year.

As a result of the December meeting, the US Federal Reserve System decided to taper the quantitative easing program by USD 10 billion per month and to keep the targeted range of the federal funds rate between 0 and 0.25% per annum. The information about curtailing government incentives became known at the end of December 2013. The market accepted this information calmly. This is why the specification on the volumes to be tapered also did not become a significant factor that could influence markets over the previous week.

Financial markets survey 13.01.2014