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Chart: Speculative Sentiment Index on Friday, June 12, 2026Trump halts strikes against Iran, says peace agreement to be signed "in the coming days," causing international oil prices to plummet. A quick chart shows the pre-market conversion of domestic and international crude oil prices.According to Futures News on June 12, as of 8:30 AM Beijing time, spot platinum rose 0.56% and spot palladium rose 1.50%.June 12 (Futures News) – Since the second quarter, gold prices have continued to decline, and market pessimism has spread. Signals from the options market indicate that some traders are betting that this decline will continue for the next two years. 1. According to ThinkOrSwim and SpotGamma data, approximately $200 million in premiums were traded in the GLD options market on Wednesday, of which $130 million was related to put options. Of the top 10 contracts by trading volume, 8 were put options, and more than half of the put option premiums were traded at or above the ask price, indicating that these contracts were primarily bought. The second most traded option contract was a put contract expiring in June 2028 with a strike price of $240, priced at $11.50 per contract – this is a deep bearish bet, meaning traders expect the GLD ETF (SPDR Gold Trust) to fall by approximately 40% over the next two years. 2. Market participants told Futures Daily that the recent decline in gold prices is not due to the collapse of the long-term bull market foundation, but rather to the concentrated release of short-term macroeconomic negative factors, among which the change in expectations for the Federal Reserves monetary policy is the core negative factor. 3. Lin Zhenlong, senior precious metals analyst at Shanjin Futures, added that the core reason for the more than 20% drop in gold prices since the beginning of the year is a phased shift in market pricing power, rather than a failure of long-term logic. Long-term supporting factors such as central bank gold purchases and de-dollarization remain unchanged, but the short-term trading focus has completely shifted to interest rates. The increase in US Treasury yields and the strengthening of the US dollar have raised the cost of holding gold, triggering a sell-off by bulls. Currently, the impact of real interest rates on gold prices far exceeds traditional supporting factors such as safe-haven assets. In the medium to long term, the supporting logic for a long-term bull market in gold remains solid. However, before a substantial shift in Federal Reserve policy and confirmation that US Treasury yields have peaked, gold is unlikely to start a trend of upward movement and will most likely continue to fluctuate and consolidate at the bottom. (This content and opinion are for reference only and do not constitute any investment advice.)Euro Stoxx 50 futures rose 1.8%, German DAX futures rose 1.7%, and UK FTSE futures rose 0.9%.

Microsoft Faces a New EU Antitrust Suit Regarding Cloud Computing Methods

Skylar Williams

Nov 09, 2022 15:57

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Amazon is a member of the trade association CISPE, which on Wednesday filed a new antitrust complaint against Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) over its cloud computing operations with European Union antitrust inspectors.


According to CISPE, Microsoft's newly imposed contractual terms and other actions have irreparably destroyed the European cloud computing ecosystem.


Amazon is the cloud computing industry leader, followed by Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL) subsidiaries Google and Microsoft.


"By exploiting its dominance in productivity software, Microsoft restricts alternatives and inflates costs as European customers migrate to the cloud, harming Europe's digital economy," said Francisco Mingorance, secretary general of the CISPE.


In their complaint to the European Commission, CISPE said that the company uses its dominance in productivity software to direct European customers to its Azure cloud infrastructure at the cost of European rivals.


Microsoft was accused of discriminatory product bundling and linking, price discrimination, and technical and competitive customer lock-in.


Microsoft, which has been fined more than €1.6 billion ($1.6 billion) over the previous decade by the European Commission for various antitrust violations, has said in the past that it provides its software to all customers, including competitive cloud service providers.


In the last several years, cloud service providers from Germany, Italy, Denmark, and France, of whom two are members of CISPE, have raised analogous concerns with the Commission.


Microsoft amended licensing agreements and made other changes to make it easier for cloud service providers to compete starting October 1 in an attempt to satisfy EU antitrust concerns.


Rivals Excluded are cloud services from Amazon.com (NASDAQ:AMZN), Alphabet's Google, Alibaba (NYSE:BABA), and Microsoft.


The CISPE said that the EU competition authority should address the issue by applying to Microsoft the principles of fair software licensing set by the trade association the previous year.


It was said that an independent European Observatory may be created to assess the licensing terms of significant software companies.


According to CISPE, the Commission may add a language to the newly passed Digital Markets Act prohibiting cloud computing gatekeepers from preferring their own software applications.