With everyone focused on the Eurozone, the Swiss franc and the Greek elections, it is easy to lose sight of other news taking place around the world. And there is always plenty of activity to report.
Let’s look first at the United States where the ubiquitous Bitcoin is set to have its first regulated exchange. San Francisco-based Coinbase which offers storage services for bitcoin users is opening a new exchange on Monday morning. According to a report in the Wall Street Journal, Lunar, as the exchange is called, will have regulatory approval in half of the states in the nation including New York and California.
The Bitcoin is a virtual currency that allows users to exchange online credits for goods and services. Since there is no central bank that issues them, bitcoins are created online using a computer in a process called mining.
The announcement caused the value of the currency to jump and might just pump some much-needed trust back into the digital currency, which saw its value plummet 65 percent in 2014 after the Japanese bitcoin exchange, Mt. Gox, declared insolvency and with the more recent trading suspension at Bitstamp, the second-largest dollar-bitcoin exchange. With the pronouncement of the opening of a regulatory exchange, the Bitcoin soared 16 percent on Monday morning and was trading close to $300 per bitcoin.
iPhones
In other news, Apple is expected to announce that it sold more iPhones in China last year than at home in 2014, highlighting the shifting power balance of the smartphone market. The U.S. tech group expanded its presence in China last year by connecting with China Mobile, the country's largest network operator and following the release of the latest iPhone 6 in the country last October.
China’s home spun tech group, Samsung, seems to be faltering as the global market leader as the region moves over to Samsung’s low-cost challenger, Xiaomi.
Analysts at UBS estimate that China accounted for 36 per cent of iPhone shipments in the last quarter, compared with 24 per cent for the US. During the same period last year, 29 per cent of units were sold in the US and 22 per cent were in China, UBS said.
"It's already been a good year, building up to the climax of this quarter," said Ben Bajarin, analyst at Creative Strategies. According to Bajarin, more than 2m more iPhones were sold in China than North America in the quarter. The launch in China of Apple's new Watch in the coming months could bring in additional first-time Apple customers.
Davos
Since 1971, academic, political, and corporate leaders from across the globe have gathered in the Swiss town of Davos to discuss critical issues facing the year ahead. This year more than 2,500 leaders attended the World Economic Forum in Davos, including presidents, CEOs, financial gurus and even internationally-acclaimed musicians, Pharrell Williams and Will.i.Am.
Economic conditions were certainly not the best at the end of 2014 but central bankers and economic leaders at the World Economic Forum were more upbeat about economic prospects for the year ahead. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) is forecasting a 3.5% growth this year and analysts pointed to the upside potential of the European Central Bank stimulus package, falling oil prices, structural change in Brazil, China and Japan, and robust growth in the United States as indicators that 2015 could turn out to be better economically than previously anticipated.
Many panelists at the Global Economic Outlook session welcomed the ECB package while emphasizing the need to back up this monetary move with structural reforms while most panelists saw the decline in oil prices as a boost to growth in most economies that could ease the transition to structural reform.
Min Zhu, Deputy Managing Director, at the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in Washington DC, noted that while U.S. economic performance is strong and is providing considerable enhancement to global demand, much of the growth is coming from government spending and consumers with private investment remaining relatively low. Zhu called on policy-makers to put more emphasis on the poorer countries, which have been hit hard by many economic challenges.