- Eastern Europe outperforms –
Even before his inauguration, President-elect Donald Trump caused a stir not only with his provocative demands at a press conference, but also with the official launch of his own Trump Meme Coin on the Solana blockchain on 18 January. In just a few hours, the Trump Meme Coin multiplied from 20 million USD to a market value of 14 billion and a day later to 65 billion USD at a rate of 65 USD. Since Trump wants to make the USA a new world power in cryptocurrencies, too, all crypto fans are looking forward to the ‘golden Trump age’. Ripple (XRP) had previously seen the greatest increase due to its good relations with Trump. The value of XRP has already increased sixfold from 0.5 to 3.0 XRP/USD. For many crypto fans, however, this is just the beginning of a long journey, as XRP now even wants to compete with PayPal and push the tokenisation of US assets. The restrictions on crypto investors are now to be lifted under Trump/Musk and the SEC is to lose some of its control powers.
But not only cryptocurrencies benefited from Trump’s election victory, so did many stock markets. In contrast to the indices in the US, the DAX even reached a new all-time high of over 20,900 index points on 17 January, which means a price increase of 4% since the beginning of the year. However, as in the previous year, many stock markets in Eastern Europe performed even better. Yet another reason for investors to take a closer look at the stock markets of Eastern Europe. As in the previous year, the top performers included – surprise, surprise – the Kiev stock exchange, even though the war is far from over. But the Balkan region and the Baltic states also performed impressively.
But the KTX Local Index for equities from Kazakhstan also rose by more than 30% last year. It is now up by more than 6% again and is a clear outperformer. Investors willing to take risks can purchase shares in Kazakhstan directly online from the broker Freedom Finance (Freedom Broker) in Cyprus, provided that they open an account there first, which is easily done via the following link: https://freedom24.com/invite_from/2952896.
Andreas Männicke also shares his views on the new opportunities in Eastern Europe in his stock market letter EAST STOCK TRENDS (www.eaststock.de) and in his new EastStockTV video, episode 245 at www.YouTube.com. You can also register for free with the new BRICS TV channel on YouTube and order the new stock market letter BRICS Trends by emailing info@eaststock.de. You can watch the first BRICS TV video here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FEKI72GKCzs&t=315s . Please also register if you are interested in receiving the new BRICS newsletter. You can also read an introduction to the BRICS topic in VTAD News No. 42 and/or request it by emailing info@eaststock.de.
Trump causes a stir even before his inauguration with his Trump Meme Coin
Even before his inauguration on 20 January, the new US President Donald Trump caused a lot of excitement and attention with his own Trump meme coin, which his sons had prepared. On 18 January, the coin was officially launched on the Solana blockchain. However, the introduction also benefited the cryptocurrency Solana, whose exchange rate rose by around 50% from 180 to 280 SOL/USD. With his Trump Meme Coin, Trump wants to set an example as a visionary for the development of digital cryptocurrencies for the alternative financing of projects without banks. Trump himself changed from being one of the harshest critics of cryptocurrencies to one of their strongest supporters, which was probably also due to the ‘advice’ of Elon Musk, who is also a ‘crypto fan’. Together with his three sons, Trump founded his own crypto and investment platform called World Liberty Financial.
First US president with a clear focus on cryptocurrencies
Trump is now the first US president to advocate for cryptocurrencies and NFTs, which has never happened before in this form in US history. The developers of the Trump meme coin are the same developers of the NFT project, but they belong to the Trump organisation, namely CIC Digital and Fight Fight Fight. The developers hold 80% of the coin’s value, but have a three-year lock-up period. Within three years, a further 800 million Trump meme coins are to come onto the market. Interested parties can find out more about the coin and buy and sell it using the Moonshot app at https://gettrumpmemes.com/.
Trump has created a monument for himself in the crypto market
Trump is creating a monument for himself in the crypto market with his Trump coin. Many crypto fans are grateful to him for this and see it as the starting signal for a gigantic new crypto world. The Trump Meme Coin is the largest meme coin in crypto history, now worth $65 billion, although its value changes by the minute. Meme coins are coins from famous people with a strong community, so they are something like a commemorative coin in digital form. Meme coins are highly speculative and promise enormous profits in a short time, but can also lead to a total loss. Trump’s meme coin is not actually intended as an investment or security, but rather to support Trump’s ideals and approach. Meme coins have no economic use. However, social networks such as X, TikTok and Instagram quickly created an incredible hype around them. But it should be clear to everyone that this is also a pure speculative bubble with no intrinsic value.
Crypto investors don’t think in percentages, they think in factors
The price development of the first Trump meme coin is nothing short of breathtaking. Initially, 200 million coins were issued on 18 January. After just 15 months, the price doubled after Trump himself announced the launch on his account. After three hours, the coin was already worth USD 2 billion, a tenbagger (fourteenfold, factor of 10). Crypto investors often don’t think in terms of percentages, but rather by what factor the cryptocurrency can increase in what time, taking into account a high degree of fluctuation.
Bitcoin again close to all-time high
Since the end of 2011, the leading cryptocurrency Bitcoin (BTC) has increased by a factor of 100,000 from 1 to over 100,000 BTC/USD and since the end of 2022 by a factor of 10 from 10,000 to over 100,000 BTC/USD. Now, even prices of 1 million BTC/USD no longer seem utopian (another factor of 10). However, the Bitcoin rose only slightly to 104,000 BTC/USD after the introduction of the Trump meme coin, which is now close to the old all-time high again. The second-largest cryptocurrency, Ethereum, has hardly moved at all and has been trending sideways at just over 3300 ETH/USD. Depending on what is currently the focus of attention on social networks and of the so-called ‘whales’, i.e. the major investors in cryptocurrencies, different cryptocurrencies are repeatedly favoured and catapulted into incredible market valuations that can hardly be grasped or understood from a fundamental valuation perspective.
Breathtaking price development of the Trump meme coin in the first hours of trading
After the announcement of the introduction of Trump’s social network Truth Social at 6 p.m. Washington time, the price of $200 million rose to $24 billion in just eight hours, at a price of $24, which corresponds to a factor of 120. Later, on 19 January, the price even reached a high of USD 75 before falling back to USD 6, giving a market cap of USD 65 billion. This corresponds to a factor of 325. With an investment of just 100 US dollars, you could have made a profit of 324,000 US dollars in one day, and with 10,000 US dollars, you could have made as much as 3.25 million US dollars.
Trump made some investors millionaires in a day.
Trump has thus indirectly made many investors millionaires in one day. So for many, Trump was like winning the lottery. In the future, 800 million more coins are to be released. But be careful: many meme coins and also many altcoins have already become worthless. So an investment in meme coins and also altcoins is highly speculative. Here, too, investors should always spread their money across different projects.
TikTok was banned in the USA from 19 January
The price development was commented on by many TikTok influencers around the world, which led to a further wave of buying. However, TikTok was shut down in the US on 19 January because of suspicions that its Chinese parent company ByteDance was too close to the Chinese government, which was allegedly trying to access and spy on US data. The US Congress obliged the parent company to sell its stake in the US by 19 January, but this has not yet happened. However, Trump wants to reverse the shutdown by decree after his inauguration.
Wall Street celebrated Trump even before the inauguration.
But Trump not only pleased investors with his new Trump-Meme-Coin, but after the election victory, Wall Street immediately got into a buying mood, not only for cryptocurrencies such as XRP, but also for stocks. The S&P index rose by 15% to new all-time highs after Trump’s election victory, and Tesla even rose by 80% to a new all-time high. This also supported the DAX, which even reached a new all-time high of over 20,900 index points on 17 January, which means an increase of 4% since the beginning of the year. Thus, the DAX has so far clearly outperformed all indices on Wall Street.
Is the Trump trade 2.0 coming in Ukraine?
However, many stock markets in Eastern Europe performed even better, clearly outperforming the DAX as they did last year. If Trump actually manages to bring about not only a ceasefire and peace in Israel, but also in Ukraine, the proverbially bombed-out share prices on the Kiev stock exchange should benefit in particular. There has been a lot of betting on this in advance, which has led to rising prices for some Ukrainian stocks. If Trump really does achieve peace in Ukraine and Ukrainian stocks rise sharply as a result, that would be the Trump Trade 2.0. Insofern, it is still worth taking a look at Eastern Europe.
Significant outperformance opportunities still exist in Eastern Europe
Unbeknown to most investors, 13 stock exchanges in Eastern Europe are among the 20 best-performing stock exchanges in the world this year, as they were last year. 6 of them have even clearly outperformed the DAX once again. The year before last, the Central Eastern European stock markets in Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic were particularly convincing as outperformers, with a performance of over 40%. Last year, it was mainly the stock market indices from the Balkan region, with price increases of over 30% in Slovenia, Croatia and Serbia, and over 30% in Kazakhstan. The top performer, however, was the Ukrainian stock market, despite the war there, with a gain of 60% for the MSCI Ukraine Index.
But this year, too, many stock markets in Eastern Europe are among the top performers. The stock market indices from the following Eastern European countries clearly outperformed the DAX, but above all all Wall Street indices:
13 stock markets from Eastern Europe were among the 20 best-performing stock markets in the world up to 17 January 2025. The best performers so far were the stock markets in Ukraine (+11.0%), Croatia (+7.0%), Poland (+6.7%), Lithuania (+5.9%), Hungary (+5.8%), Kazakhstan (+5.6%), Czech Republic (+4.0%). Slovenia (+2.9%), Estonia (+2.9%) and Romania (+1.1%). In red, 13 Eastern European markets, with 6 outperforming the DAX (+4.4%) until 17 January! CECE index +5.85%, CECE bank index +4.8%! SETX 2.71%!
The CECE index (with Poland, the Czech Republic and Hungary on board) has already risen by 5.85% and the SETX index (for South-East Europe) has already risen by 2.71%. Continue to back banks in Eastern Europe, as the CECE banks index has already risen by 4.8%. But also pay attention to the promising stocks from Kazakhstan.
Freedom Broker offers market access to Kazakhstan
The KTX Local Index for stocks from Kazakhstan has already risen by 30% last year and 6.5% this year. You can also buy shares from Kazakhstan directly online through the Cyprus-based broker Freedom Finance, which has the advantage that you quickly receive the sometimes very high dividends in your account. For example, Halyk Bank even has a dividend yield of 16% and a return on equity of 34%. The world’s second largest uranium producer, Kazatomprom, could benefit this year if Russia stops exporting uranium to Russia. It is easy to open a counter-position online at the following link: https://freedom24.com/invite_from /2952896. If you need advice on exchanging Russian ADRs for original shares, Freedom Broker, which also has a branch in Berlin, is also the place to go. In particular, if US sanctions are lifted, trading opportunities on the Moscow stock exchange may arise again, but this remains to be seen.
Inform first, then invest
Find out now in detail about the background and development of the Ukraine/Russia crisis, but also the future recovery potential of undervalued Eastern European equities. There are also new opportunities in the Baltic states, Southeastern Europe and the CIS republics (Kazakhstan, Georgia), with the respective stock indices all up in 2023. In 2023, 12 stock exchanges from Eastern Europe were among the 30 best-performing stock markets in the world, with 5 clearly outperforming the DAX. In 2024, 9 stock exchanges in Eastern Europe were once again able to outperform with a strong plus. And at the beginning of the year, there were already 6 stock exchanges in Eastern Europe that clearly outperformed the DAX. It is therefore still worth looking beyond the end of one’s nose to Eastern Europe.
So order a trial subscription (3 issues by email for just €15) of the monthly market letter EAST STOCK TRENDS (EST), which includes another Ukraine/Kazakhstan special and a dividend special, as well as a lot of background information and new investment suggestions such as the ‘share of the month’ and lucrative certificates at www.eaststock.de, there under Börsenbrief. The last EST appeared on 27 December 2024.
TV/Radio Notes: On 5 February 2024, Andreas Männicke was interviewed by Carola Ferstl on Money Talk about gold, commodities and the new opportunities in Eastern Europe. On 5 December 2024, Andreas Männicke was interviewed by Heinrich Leben on Börsenradio Networks about the new opportunities in Eastern Europe, particularly in Ukraine after the end of the war. All radio and TV interviews can be downloaded from the video archive at www.eaststock.de, including the latest video on EastStockTV, episode 245. By the way: Have you already subscribed to the new YouTube channel – BRICS-TV, in addition to the EastStockTV YouTube channel?
Reading note: in the new issue of VTAD News No. 42, Andreas Männicke provides a detailed report on BRICS as a new investment opportunity.
Seminar note: If you are interested in new Eastern Exchange seminars ‘Go East’ or a BRICS seminar in Frankfurt/M or other cities, please contact the EST editorial team (www.eaststock.de). If you are interested in Eastern stock market webinars and BRICS webinars, please also register.
You can now also order Andreas Männicke’s free newsletter with the latest news about the world and Eastern stock markets and the BRICS at www.eaststock.de. Please also register at info@eaststock.de if you are interested in a new BRICS newsletter from Andreas Männicke.