European stock markets are trading sideways this morning as there aren’t any major macroeconomic stories that dealers can get inspiration from. Equity markets have been by-and-large lacking volatility recently, and the indices in Europe are tame in comparison with US stock markets.
Anglo American (LON:AAL), Rio Tinto (LON:RIO), BHP Billiton (LON:BLT), and Glencore (LON:GLEN) are in the red this morning on the back of the Chinese trade figures, which showed that both imports and exports came in below expectations. The cooling of imports prompted dealers to dump basic resource stocks as the country has lost a bit of its appetite for minerals.
Shares in Standard Life (LON:SL) are down 1.8% today after the company announced an increase in assets under administration and a rise in pre-tax profits 1% of 6% respectively. The asset manager saw inflows dip and outflows tick up, but all in all it was a solid update. The shares have been on a positive run since April, and they hit their highest level since August 2015 on Friday, so today’s pullback isn’t anything to get worried about.
The EUR/USD and GBP/USD are up on the day as there is a broad dip in the US dollar. Yesterday, Federal Reserve member Esther George said she was in favour of the Fed’s ‘gradual approach’ to unwinding of the $4.5 trillion balance sheet.
Traders shrugged off the disappointing German trade data, where exports and imports dropped by 2.8% and 4.5% respectively. When you take into consideration yesterday’s drop in industrial production, you could draw the conclusion that the strength in the euro is impacting the Germany economy.
We are anticipating the Dow Jones to open 13 points lower at 22,105, and we are calling the S&P 500 down 2 at 2478.
At 3pm the US will announces the job openings and labour turnover summary (JOLTS) for June, and economists are expecting 5.77 million, and that would be an increase from May’s 5.66 million. Keep in mind we had a strong set of job numbers from the US on Friday.
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