This week trading activity is compressed into 4 days. Easter Celebrations shorten the week, looking at the equity markets with the S%P +2.7%, the DAX up 3.11% MTD - we expect there to be Month End activity with volatility potential increased due to the lack of liquidity and market participants being OOO.
Overnight in commodities, oil gained on escalating geopolitical unrest following attacks in Russia, as well as positive commentary about the outlook for commodities, West Texas Intermediate crude rose 0.5% to $81 a barrel. Gold was little changed at $2167per ounce, while iron ore held its largest weekly advance in six months. Bitcoin rose 1.5% to $67,158.48, Ether rose 1.5% to $3,466.18 whilst Cable sits close to the 200 day moving average at 1.2592.
On the data front this week in the U.S. we have durable goods orders figures for February, these are released on Tuesday, and a final reading for the University of Michigan's consumer confidence survey for March, on Thursday. Whilst in Germany Tuesday will see the release of the consumer confidence index for April, followed by retail sales data for February on Thursday. Euro area M3 money supply figures for February will also be published on Thursday.
As for today we US new home sales, Monday and speeches from the Bank of England policymaker Catherine Mann and the Fed’s Austan Goolsbee, Lisa Cook, Raphael Bostic will all voice opinions.
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