WALL STREET JOURNAL ARTICLE REVIEW

 

I am posting the directions below. Here is a summary of the key points.

1) This assignment is due on Saturday, November 9th.

2) You are to pick THREE of the 12 topics listed and choose a WSJ article on that topic.

3) For this week, you will write THREE two-page each (at least) report due on Saturday.

4) Notice for this article, you must include the four steps mentioned below.

  

For each article, complete the following steps:

1.   

Include the title, author’s name, and date of the publication

2.   

Describe the author’s purpose

3.   

Provide a summary of the article

4.   

Create 2 questions that arise when reading the article

 

Choose 3 different articles from the Wall Street Journal that cover the following areas during this course:

1.    Interest rates

2.    Bond market

3.    Stock market

4.    Federal Reserve’s monetary policy

5.   
Mortgage market

6.   
Foreign exchange market

7.   
Depository Institutions

8.   
Insurance

9.   
Pension plan

10.
Mutual funds

11.
Forwards, futures, and options

12.
Swaps

  

Each article must be at least 2 pages in length and must include citations to show support for your statements.

You will turn in the three assignments in Module/Week 3

 

These assignments must be submitted by 11:59 p.m. (ET) on Saturday of the assigned module/week

     

HOW TO FIND THE WALL STREET JOURNAL (WSJ) MAGAZINE ONLINE

Step 1. Use your web browser to search for:
http://www.liberty.edu/informationservices/ilrc/library/

• If this link is not working, search for and type “Library” http://www.luonline.com/
into the search bar:

Step 2. If you are off-campus, log into EZproxy to access library materials.

Step 3. Click on the Articles/Journals/Databases link

Step 4. Click the drop-down next to the search box and select “Journal Finder,” then type “Wall
Street Journal” into the textbox and search.

http://www.liberty.edu/informationservices/ilrc/library/

http://www.luonline.com/

Step 5. A new window should open with a list of results for the WSJ. Find and click the link that
says “ProQuest Newsstand (Complete) (Legacy Platform)”:

a. You can find the WSJ Newspaper by clicking the Publication Tab:

b. This will open a new webpage. Use this Search bar to find the Wall Street Journal
Newspaper.

c. A list of results will populate. Select the Wall Street Journal (Online): New York, N.Y.

Step 6. Search for the terms related to your assignment topic and begin researching.

·Title: Big Banks are ramping up their technology spending to maintain their dominance of the foreign exchange market

Author’s Name: Davis, Stephen

Date of the Publication: November 2, 2011

Author’s Purpose: Big banks realize that they must invest in technology if they are going to remain competitive in the foreign exchange market. They understand that telephone-based transactions are diminishing and that electronic trading is the predominant method of choice for today’s investors. Perennial markets leaders such as, Barclays, Citigroup, Deutsche Bank, Goldman Sachs Group, JPMorgan Chase & Co., Morgan Stanley, Royal Bank of Scotland Group, and UBS know that the stakes are high as the foreign exchange market brings in hundreds of millions in annual profits. Big banks must continue to refine their process by offering solid customer service through the use of new technology innovations and good decision making.

Article Summary: Big banks understand the importance of investing in solid infrastructure to gain a technological and logistical advantage over their competition. Customers love choices especially when it comes to saving and making money. Foreign exchange market trading brings in more than 1-billion in a good financial year and big banks want a piece of this consumer action. In fact, economists cite electronic trading as the primary driver of the post crisis recovery in currency-trading volume, which at an estimated $3.98 trillion daily in 2010 was some 20 percent above 2007 levels. However, the result of these developments has been nothing less than a technology arms race among the banks and multi-dealer platforms to provide faster, easier and cheaper trading services. For the big banks such a race can require spending $100 million or more a year on technology, analysts and industry executives say. Aite Group estimates that banks’ spending reached an all-time high of $1.5 billion in 2010, double the amount spent just four years earlier. One of the most significant innovations in the latest-generation platforms include enhancing trading tools and the addition of other asset classes, such as currency derivatives. In fact, over the past 5-years, Barclay has virtually doubled its global market share between 2005 and 2010, rising to No. 3 in the Euromoney ranking. Its BARX FX, now claims one of the industry’s biggest footprints, with more than 2,500 institutional clients.

Comments: Banks must continue to use cutting edge technology to meet and exceed customer expectations. This should enable sustained business growth in trading volume and customer satisfaction levels. Greater competition generally ensures that customer have expanded opportunities to invest and to make quicker decisions. Implementing new processes, procedures, and tools are critical to the ongoing existence of big banks. Offering the right tools for customer to use and having the right infrastructure to process and handle those investment decisions is the paramount objective.