Happy new year to all of you and may the new year bring us a step closer to what all of us are looking for.
In the first official trading day of the new year, trading is expected to be subdued due to the lack of major economic news releases. Japan is also still on holiday and markets are closed. Focus in the European session will be on the CPI data for December in Germany as well as UK manufacturing PMI for the same month. Later in the week, risk events include FOMC Minutes and the Non-Farm Payrolls on Friday.
Currencies:Â Commodity currencies such as the AUD and NZD opened the year higher after Chinese manufacturing data came out to be better than expected. As Australia and NZ are trading partners of China, any slowdown in China influences their economy negatively and vice versa. Canadian Dollar is also very strong today, as the Oil prices rebounded further. OPEC decided to cut its crude production by 1.2 million barrels, effective January, 2017, while non-OPEC producers, including Russia but not the US, would reduce output by around 0.6M bpd. EUR/USD is trading at 1.0460, down from 1.0652 reached on Friday, while GBP/USD dropped from Fridays high of 1.2386 to trade at 1.2284 at time of writing. Â The greenback had soared to 14-year highs in December on speculation the U.S. Federal Reserve will hike rates as many as three times this year, and that President-elect Donald Trump will stoke growth and inflation with debt-funded tax cuts.
Stocks: Global stock markets continued to march into 2017 with Asian stocks extending gains after European shares surged to the highest point in over a year. Australian shares were the best performers in the region with a 1.2 percent jump. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng rose 0.5 percent. DAX opened today at its highest since June 2015, while FTSE is at its all-time high this morning. The UK FTSE closed the year 14.42% up in 2016.
Oil and Gold: Oil prices rose in the first hours of 2017, helped by hopes that deal between OPEC and non-OPEC members to cut production, which kicked in on Sunday, will be effective in draining a global supply glut. International Brent crude oil prices were up 16 cents, or 0.3 percent, at $56.98 a barrel at 0802 GMT on Tuesday – close to last year’s high of $57.89 per barrel, hit on Dec. 12. Oil markets were closed on Monday after the New Year’s holiday. U.S. benchmark West Texas Intermediate (WTI) CLc1 crude oil prices were up 22 cents, or 0.41 percent, at $53.94 a barrel, not far from last year’s high of $54.51 reached on Dec. 12. After gaining more than 8% in 2016, gold extended its strong run into the New Year, pushed higher in 2017’s first day of trading in global markets on Tuesday by technical buying, despite pressure from a strong dollar. At 9.14am, spot gold was up 0.4% at $1,156.75 per ounce.
