Equities trade cautiously after Wall Street slump - 18.9.2020

The Dollar strengthening has halted currently ahead of the University of Michigan preliminary consumer sentiment report at 18:00 CET today. The live dollar index data show the ICE US Dollar index, a measure of the dollar’s strength against a basket of six rival currencies, slid 0.2% Thursday after Labor Department report 860 thousand Americans filed for first-time benefits instead of forecast of 825,000. At the same time the Philadelphia Fed manufacturing index fell to 15 in September from 17.2 in prior month indicating slowing of economic recovery. However housing starts rose 3% over year in August at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1.42 million. EUR/USD joined GBP/USD’s continued climbing yesterday as the Bank of England didn’t alter interest rates while meeting minutes revealed policymakers discussed how it could set negative interest rates if conditions warranted. Both Pound and euro are higher against the Dollar currently. Both yen and Australian dollar continued climbing yesterday against the greenback with the dynamics intact for both currently.

Futures on three main US stock indexes are rising currently after slumping Thursday. The three main US stock benchmarks recorded losses ranging from 0.5% to 1.3%. European stock indexes are rebounding today after ending lower Thursday. Asian indexes are moistly rising currently with Australia’s All Ordinaries ASX 200 Index leading losses.

Brent is extending gains today after Goldman Sachs report estimating “that the oil market remains in deficit with speculative positioning now at too low levels.” Oil prices rose yesterday after the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries and its allies stressed the importance of full compliance with output cuts at their monthly meeting. The US oil benchmark West Texas Intermediate (WTI) futures ended higher yesterday: October WTI rose 2% and is higher currently. November Brent crude closed 2.6% higher at $43.30 a barrel on Thursday.