The British pound managed to keep its upward movement against its major currency counterparts during the past week as well. Upbeat data coming from the UK’s labour sector led to appreciation of the GBP/USD pair to 1.5872, or a climb by more than 240 pips compared to a week earlier.
Chart movements of other major currency pairs reflected on the weaker dollar in the past few days. As a result, the EUR/USD added 128 pips to close at 1.3301, while the AUD/USD reported a rise by 59 pips to close at 0.9248. News during the weekend revealed that an agreement has been reached between Russia and the US over the Syrian crisis, which avoids the pending threat of military intervention.
The withdrawal of Larry Summers’ candidacy for Fed chairman put extra pressure on the greenback and at the very opening of the session this morning, the EUR/USD (1.3360), the GBP/USD (1.5950), and the AUD/USD (0.9325) all took an upward direction.
Indices
Wall Street had a very strong week and all leading indices ended with significant increases. As the tension surrounding the Syrian crisis eased a bit, the S&P500 rose by 2.06% to close at 1,688 points on Friday. The Dow ended the period 3.05% higher, with the last quote on Friday being 15,376 points, while the Nasdaq100 climbed by 1.43% for the week to close at 3,178 points. This news led to a new rise of the indices this morning by about 1%.
European indices also opened more that 1% higher this morning, adding to their bullish chart movements from the past week. Germany’s DAX30 rose by 3.15% for the past five days, France’s CAC40 climbed by 1.93%, while Spain’s IBEX and Italy’s S&P/MIB increased by 3.60% and 2.99%, respectively, for the same period.
Commodities
Prices of gold (XAU/USD) and silver (XAG/USD) continued to fall during the past week, with gold reaching $1,323 per troy ounce, registering a 4.74% drop. Silver landed at $22.20, or a decline by 6.77% for the past week alone. Investors’ loss of interest in exchange-traded funds which invest in gold has led some analysts to anticipate a decline for the precious metal below $1,000 per troy ounce by the end of next year.
What to expect this week?
This week’s hugely anticipated event, branded by some analysts as the highlight of the month, will be the Fed’s meeting on Wednesday, which is set to produce the interest rate and the long-awaited decision on the future of its $85 billion-a-month stimulus programme. Other important news include the Eurozone Consumer Price Index and the US Industrial Production on Monday.
Tuesday will see quite a lot of economic data being published, including: the Reserve Bank of Australia’s Meeting Minutes, the UK’s Consumer Price Index, the ZEW Survey on the Economic Sentiment in both the Eurozone and Germany and the US Consumer Price Index on monthly and annual bases. Apart from the Fed’s meeting, Wednesday will also offer the Bank of England’s Meeting Minutes and New Zealand GDP. Thursday’s highlights will be the UK’s Retail Sales and the US Existing Home Sales Change for August. Friday will close the week with the Bank of Japan Governor Kuroda speech and the Eurozone Consumer Confidence for September.
Source: dfmarkets.co.uk