Hello, traders! Well, we are rapidly approaching the end of the first calendar quarter of 2018. Time has flown and it’s fair to say that it has been an eventful first few months of the year. Let’s look at some of the significant moves that we’ve seen so far.

The major event of this quarter would have to be the market correction at the beginning of February—within a day or so of Janet Yellen leaving her role as Head of the Federal Reserve, the market took a tumble which removed all of the gains from the preceding few months. Traders watched and waited to determine whether this would be the start of something more ominous. Let’s look at some charts:

As private traders, strong moves can be our lifeblood. When an instrument moves strongly in one direction, it creates opportunity that allows us to hop aboard and ride the wave. But what is it that makes markets move? Generally, strong moves occur when there is an imbalance between supply and demand in the markets—so what creates that?

The two drivers that determine the most likely scenarios and the anticipated impact of the upcoming general election in Germany on the global markets are the 1) party manifestos and the 2) election polls.

The single currency could continue in its upside channel versus the greenback, after Draghi has signaled that the ECB members are to talk about the QE tapering next autumn.

The weaker than expected inflation pressure in US could weigh down on the interest rate outlook driving the greenback down across the broad.

As what was widely expected and what has been highlighted in my most recent analyses, BOC raised today the target of its overnight interest rate by 0.25% to 0.75% to be the first major central bank to follow the Fed in tightening its monetary policy, after the credit crisis.

Given the buoyant global stock prices the short answer is no. Everything is going up with most major world indices sat on all time highs and the markets are floating towards the usually slow European summer months. Volatility in forex has also been consistently low over the large couple of months with short moves always being countered with retracements into the ranges.

It then seems strange to think that at a time of such a strong bull market in the equity indices that anyone could possibly talk about a financial meltdown. It is definitely a low probability event but there is still risk it could happen. Those of us that have been in the markets for 10 years or more can remember the last financial crisis. It seems very odd to this blog writer that so many people are so forgetful about this after such a short period of time.

Here are the main reasons everyone should be keeping one eye open for the start of the next financial meltdown.

After an eventful and volatile first half of 2017 we look forward to what, if any, opportunities the second half of this year bring us.

UK elections, Donald Trump, NFP Friday on 2nd June and so much more. Market uncertainty and volatility are back and there are a lot of factors which traders need to consider. Here is an interesting article, from the professional trader Malte Kaub, for an insight into how traders can navigate the markets through this unprecedented uncertainty.