If you’ve found yourself accidentally turning to the business section of the newspaper in the last few years, you may have noticed plenty of economists, market analysts, and other people who sound like they’d be no fun at a backyard barbecue talking about something called Quantitative Easing. That’s usually a good time to turn over to the funnies, but today let’s cover off what Quantitative Easing (QE) is about, starting with a brief history lesson.

Given that it’s the New Year, the OrbitRemit blog is reflecting on the year just gone. More than any other year in the last decade, 2016 had huge ups and downs – including a number of seemingly game changing events. Join us as we reflect on the biggest stories of 2016 in chronological order, and our analysis as to how these may change things going forward. 

Despite being only a number of weeks into 2016, global financial markets have opened to a pretty rocky start. Slumping commodity demand from China, one of the world’s largest consumers, has led to an oversupply (and price crash) of oil, iron ore, and copper. This caused substantial falls in both the US and Australian stock markets and set the currency markets into a frenzy. But what happens next? We’re going to take you through our predictions for the AUD/USD over the next year or so.

After two days of debating, the United States Federal Reserve (the Fed) decided not to raise the Federal Funds Rate at its Federal Open Market Committee meeting on the 17th September. Their next meeting is set for the 28th of October, keeping financial traders, analysts and international businesses on their toes. But why is the Federal Funds Rate important to anyone outside of the US? Well, we’re going to explain that – along with some predictions as to what will happen to the rate.