Weekly Market Recap – July 13th, 2018

In the Markets

Last week NATO leaders met in Brussels, focusing on member nations’ commitments to increased military spending. Tensions were high going into the summit, as President Trump had questioned the usefulness of the alliance, but that sentiment shifted following the summit, with President Trump maintaining belief in NATO. Central to discussions was the failure of some member nations to reach the 2% GDP target for collective military spending contributions, with Trump pushing not only for each ally nation to meet the financing target, but to do so at a rapid pace.

Following the NATO summit, President Trump travelled to England to meet with British Prime Minister Theresa May. On Friday the two discussed U.K.-U.S. relations in a post Brexit world, including a bilateral trade agreement between the two nations. Trump also clarified alleged criticisms he had made of May’s handling of Brexit, and showed support for anti-immigration stances that were strong fuel for Britain leaving the EU.

Grains suffered heavy losses this week in the wake of the WASDE report as the markets await further developments between the U.S. and China. Soybeans plummeted 6.74%, while corn fell 4.89%, and wheat dropped 3.54%.

Precious metals also posted losses, with gold falling 1.16%, silver down 1.58%, and platinum dipping to 2.16%. Commodities faced losses across the board, with oil also correcting lower in both WTI and Crude futures, which dropped 3.78% and 2.52% respectively.

While commodities showed weakness, the major indexes showed gains as trade fears took a back seat in the minds of equities investors. The S&P 500 rose 1.5%, the NASDAQ climbed 1.8%, and the Dow Jones Industrial Average posted the strongest performance, climbing over 500 points, up 2.3% and breaking the 25,000 mark.

World Cup Trading Championships

Three time WCTC champion Kurt Sakaeda has hovered around the top 5 all year, including a current 21 day streak on the leaderboard, but last week he soared to a new year high, breaking into second place. Sakaeda rallied over 20% to finish with a net return of 120% on the year, only 28% behind the leader Jan Smolen, the closest spread since Smolen took over first place on May 21st. Smolen still held onto first place, with a net return of 148%, and Paul Skarp finished in third with a net return of 103.8%.

Carlos Eisenberg posted a stunning week, finishing with a net return of 92.5%, gaining 35% from the prior week. This puts the spread between fourth and first place barely above 50%, marking for an incredibly tight race moving forward.

Takumaru Sakakibara rounded out the top 5 again, finishing with a net return of 43.6%.

Trading futures and forex involves significant risk of loss and is not suitable for everyone. Past performance is not necessarily indicative of future results. World Cup Championship (WCC ) accounts do not necessarily represent all the trading accounts controlled by a given competitor. WCC competitors may control accounts that produce results substantially different than the results achieved in their WCC accounts. WCC entrants may trade more than one account in the competition.