- US stocks fall again while US Jobless Claims fall to a near 18-month low.
- The Dow was lower by 0.43%, the S&P 500 was down 0.46% and the NASDAQ was off by 0.38%.
Wall Street ended lower on Thursday and the S&P 500 and Dow Jones Industrial Average are now down four straight days.
The Dow was lower by 0.43%, the S&P 500 was down 0.46% and the NASDAQ was off by 0.38%.
Weekly jobless claims fell to a near 18-month low, allaying fears of a slowing economic recovery, but also stoking worries the Fed could move sooner than expected to scale back its accommodative policies.
The Labor Department said initial claims for state unemployment benefits dropped 35,000 to a seasonally adjusted 310,000 for the week ended Sept. 4, the lowest level since mid-March 2020.
That suggested that job growth could be hindered by labour shortages rather than cooling demand for workers.
In other news, ECB President, Christine Lagarde, presented an upbeat assessment of euro area growth after
The ECB ‘moderately’ lowered the pace of PEPP purchases for Q4. This keeps all options open for December when we expect PEPP to be retired in favour of “more standard” unconventional stimulus.
The inflation projections were revised up, but not to the extent that they sound hawkish.
Overall, the market is range-bound ahead of the Federal Reserve this month, wondering when the Fed will scale back massive measures enacted last year to shield the economy from the coronavirus pandemic.
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EUR/USD treads water just above 1.0400 post-US data
Another sign of the good health of the US economy came in response to firm flash US Manufacturing and Services PMIs, which in turn reinforced further the already strong performance of the US Dollar, relegating EUR/USD to the 1.0400 neighbourhood on Friday.
GBP/USD remains depressed near 1.2520 on stronger Dollar
Poor results from the UK docket kept the British pound on the back foot on Thursday, hovering around the low-1.2500s in a context of generalized weakness in the risk-linked galaxy vs. another outstanding day in the Greenback.
Gold keeps the bid bias unchanged near $2,700
Persistent safe haven demand continues to prop up the march north in Gold prices so far on Friday, hitting new two-week tops past the key $2,700 mark per troy ounce despite extra strength in the Greenback and mixed US yields.
Geopolitics back on the radar
Rising tensions between Russia and Ukraine caused renewed unease in the markets this week. Putin signed an amendment to Russian nuclear doctrine, which allows Russia to use nuclear weapons for retaliating against strikes carried out with conventional weapons.
Eurozone PMI sounds the alarm about growth once more
The composite PMI dropped from 50 to 48.1, once more stressing growth concerns for the eurozone. Hard data has actually come in better than expected recently – so ahead of the December meeting, the ECB has to figure out whether this is the PMI crying wolf or whether it should take this signal seriously. We think it’s the latter.
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