Summary:
- Oil.WTI has moved back above the $48 handle after another DOE drawdown
- EURGBP trades above 0.92 at 8-year high
- US stocks drift lower but remain higher on the week
The biggest economic release of the week for Oil traders has shown yet another decline in DOE inventories, with a drop of 3.3M announced this afternoon. The decline was inline with the expectations – an extremely rare event in itself – and also not too dissimilar to last night’s API reading of -3.6M. Whilst the immediate market reaction was somewhat volatile, price has begun to rise with Oil.WTI now back above the $48 handle.
The main economic release from the US today has offered mixed messages on the US economy with the services PMI beating forecasts and the manufacturing disappointing. The US dollar has been relatively subdued in the most recent session with these latest data points failing to provide a clear catalyst for a significant move. Along these lines the latest positioning data may offer some food for thought.
Elsewhere in the FX space, the pound has fallen further and is trading lower across the board apart from the Australian dollar and the New Zealand dollar. In terms of individual crosses involving the pound the EURGBP is attracting the most attention as the pair has hit an 8-year high today – if we don’t count the flash crash seen in GBP last October where prices traded aren’t as reliable.
The Wall Street open saw all three major US indices open lower than last night’s close with the US500, US100 and US30 all lower by around half a percent. Tuesday’s session was strong one for the US500 with the market rallying out the gate on the cash open a rarely looking back during a 20 point rally that lasted into the close. However some of these declines have been pared into the European close.
As far as Cryptocurrencies are concerned it’s been a solid day of gains with all 5 instruments on the rise. Ripple is the standout performer adding more than 10% to Tuesday’s large rise. The latest developments in Singapore, where the country are said to be investigating the opportunity of adopting Ripple (XRPUSD on xStation) as an official form of currency.