Commodities

Bitcoin’s energy consumption could ben the real problem for Nature

The exploding price of the cryptocurrency, bitcoin, in recent months has triggered doubts not only about the financial sustainability of the rally, but also about the environmental sustainability of the currency itself.

One alarmist article in Newsweek said that bitcoin computer operations could consume "all of the world’s energy by 2020". The website Digiconomist claims that bitcoin operations use as much energy as Denmark, or enough to power 3,071,823 US households.

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OPEC meeting: Russia and its decisive key role

A reluctant Russia is expected to agree with OPEC and other producers to continue to curb global oil production, but the deal may have more caveats than initially expected by the market.

The somewhat rocky road to reaching an agreement by Thursday’s OPEC meeting has also exposed some cracks in the new world order of oil – where Saudi Arabia and Russia use their combined heft to influence prices and global supply. The cause of those "cracks" in the new ‘R-OPEC’ appears to be U.S. shale oil.

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OPEC: Russia could discuss deal cuts extension

Russia is ready to discuss an extension of a global deal between OPEC and other countries to cut oil output in Vienna on November 30, TASS news agency quoted the Energy Minister Alexander Novak as saying on Friday. The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries, Russia and several other major producers cut their combined output by about 1.8 million barrels per day since January to reduce bloated inventories and boost oil prices.

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US: Traders salaries deeper and deeper in 2017, research says

According to an annual survey by Wall Street recruiting firm Options Group, total compensation for fixed income and equities professionals in the US will be down 7% from last year, on average.

The decline is steeper still for those working in certain business lines, such as credit, rates and cash equities. And there are few bright spots. Only foreign exchange trading (+1%) and those working in electronic markets for fixed income (+7%) and equities (+3%) are expecting to see a pick-up in their compensation.

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Be IG Bank’s guest at our ProRealTime trading event

On Tuesday 21 November at 6.30pm, a very special event will take place at the Gabbani restaurant in Lugano: IG Italy’s very own trading expert Alberto Bettineschi will hold a presentation on the advanced charting package ProRealTime.

The session is open to anyone who is interested in improving their trading skills, but a basic knowledge of ProRealTime would be beneficial. You’ll learn how to set up a workspace, trade directly from charts, and create an automatic trading system to trade on your behalf.

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