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CFD Articles and Information

Footsie continues its fall on reduced bank forecasts

Shares in London followed the falls in the US with another lower opening this morning, and banks were under pressure following yesterday’s broker report on Citigroup and renewed concerns over the US credit crunch. Barclays led the way down with a 38% fall and Royal Bank of Scotland was not far behind. Also down sharply was BSkyB, even though it added 83,000 net new customers to its TV service in Q1, slightly above expectations.

Markets rally either side of the Fed announcement

26th October – Footsie fails to hold early mark up despite strong miners Shares in London opened higher for the third day running this morning following good performances overnight by Far Eastern markets, but the early strength could not be sustained. There were though some strong features in the mining sector as commodity prices rose again, with Xstrata and Rio Tinto towards the top of the list, but overall most of the action was news-led.

FTSE fails to hold early mark up despite strong miners

Shares in London opened higher for the third day running this morning following good performances overnight by Far Eastern markets, but the early strength could not be sustained. There were though some strong features in the mining sector as commodity prices rose again, with Xstrata and Rio Tinto towards the top of the list, but overall most of the action was news-led.

Why gold should be part of your stockmarket portfolio

One of the great advantages of CFD trading is that it permits you to seamlessly move within asset classes at little cost, and opens up a wealth of new contracts not just in stocks, but across a range of investment classes. Clients of Blue Index will be aware that we carry out analysis of the gold price on a daily and weekly basis, and our track record in pinpointing the regular movements in the price of the metal has been excellent.

How margin works when trading CFDs

One of the major benefits of stockmarket trading using CFDs is the ability to leverage investments by using margin. What this means is that for a small deposit, a trader can have access to a significant amount of open positions, and this has the effect of magnifying gains and losses in relation to the margin required.

The 1987 crash

Long before CFDs became commonplace, we lived in a land of early programme trading, extended settlement and mainly phone based dealing, and almost twenty years to the day occurred what is now known as ‘Black Monday’.