The fact is everyone in the financial services or wealth management business has thought about what they feel the markets will do next year. Following are the 10 market predictions for 2012 from Oliver Pursche, co-portfolio manager of GMG Defensive Beta Fund.
Israel has categorically rejected criticism by European members of the UN Security Council of its settlement activities in West Bank and East Jerusalem and growing attacks by extremist settlers on Palestinians.
A Portuguese city suspended its police chief for sending a Christmas email greeting to its entire municipal workforce which contained images of scantily clad women and seasonal wishes for a great sex life.
The outlook for Europe looks gloomy especially after the European Central Bank (ECB) warning that risks to euro area financial stability increased considerably in the second half of 2011, as the sovereign risk crisis and its interplay with the banking sector worsened in an environment of weakening macroeconomic growth prospects.
The Cape Verdean singer Cesaria Evora, known as the barefoot diva, has died at age 70, according to reports over the weekend.
Ronaldo scored a hat trick.
Italy's government easily won a confidence vote on its tough austerity package on Friday, the first step in parliamentary approval for sweeping measures aimed at saving the euro zone's third-largest economy from financial disaster.
Italy's government faces a confidence vote in parliament on Friday, called to speed up approval of a 33-billion euro ($43 billion) austerity package intended to restore financial market confidence in the euro zone's third largest economy.
A rare collection of around 38,000 Spanish coins will be auctioned by Sotheby's New York on behalf of the Hispanic Society of America.
Deutsche Boerse and NYSE Euronext have stepped up their lobbying with an advertising campaign to pressure EU regulators and secure approval for their $9 billion merger.
Despite unprecedented quantitative easing by the Fed, and $1 trillion-level U.S. budget deficits, the dollar continues to hold its own against a basket of the world's other, major currencies.
Greece, one of the worst hit countries in the Eurozone crisis, may begin official negotiations to exit the Eurozone in 2012, according to Oliver Pursche, co-portfolio manager of GMG Defensive Beta Fund.
Economic growth across the world will slow in 2012 due to the problematic combination of private-sector deleveraging, public-sector austerity and the lack of confidence in political leaders' ability to navigate these situations according to IHS, a leading macro-economic consultancy.
The bulk of the job cuts (1750) will impact the investment banking unit, Cacib.
Almost a quarter of the European Union's 500 million people have never used the Internet and there is a widening division between the web-savvy north of Europe and the poorer south and east, figures released on Wednesday showed.
The amount of gold held in exchange-traded products is near record highs and although the gold price is suffering from investors' desire for the safety of cash, the risk of this $116 billion stash of bullion being jettisoned is distant.
German lender Commerzbank and the government have been in talks for several days over possible state aid, five people familiar with the matter told Reuters on Monday.
Spain's pre-historic burial chambers have survived invasion, war, a long dictatorship and a property bubble which paved over vast tracts of the country.
It was billed as a summit to save the euro. It may be remembered as the day Europe lost patience with Britain, as most of the continent threw its lot in with European Union founding members France and Germany and committed to binding their economies ever more tightly.
United have crashed out of this year's Champions League.
Manuel Noriega, Panama's ruthless drug-running military dictator of the 1980s, is to be returned home on Sunday, headed for a jungle prison to serve a 20-year term for the murders of opponents during his rule.
European governments -- many of which are already struggling to woo buyers for sovereign debt -- could find it even harder to raise money as the investment banks they relied on to sell the debt baulk at the cost.
