Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke leaves his post shortly to be replaced by Janet Yellen. His speech yesterday ay the AEA in Philadelphia is going to be one of his last…

Goldman Sachs has highlighted a number of companies which have been laggards in 2013 and have a low valuation compared to sector peers.

A November monthly survey of 27 analysts projected Brent crude oil would average $104.10 a barrel in 2014, down from this year’s closing average price of $108.50. October’s poll saw Brent averaging $105.40 in 2014. Expectations from the same analysts are for Brent to average $102.60 in 2015.

Gold dropped another $15 today to $1188 a troy ounce, making it a 30% drop in 2013 and the worst performance for 32 years. In 2001, it was $271, in 2012 it ended the year at $1670.

Looking at the top performing UK funds and investment trusts for 2013 for those who like their money managed throws up some fascinating facts with the benefit of hindsight. The top three top performing sectors in 2013 have been the North American Smaller Companies sector, UK Smaller Companies sector and the Japanese Smaller Companies.

After the beating that many AIM oil and gas companies got in 2013, there’s plenty of news flow to look forward to from several companies notably Bowleven, Xcite and Gulf Keystone. Lets hope its good news!

On Thursday Twitter shares were up about 100% since late November, having closed at $73.31. This compares with the $26 IPO price and the opening price at its listing on the NYSE of $45 on November 7th 2013. Finally Twitter shares did drop yesterday but…

After this year’s large equity market gains driven to a large part by highly accommodative central banks around the world using ultra low interest rates and Quantitative easing, some dangers lurk in the system for investors in 2014.

The Fed released their latest financial snapshot on Boxing Day and it contained fascinating facts. No wonder they decided to start tapering at their last FOMC meeting from $85 to $75 billion a month in terms of their asset purchase programme.