Summary:
- Bitcoin recovers with strong bounce after recent declines
- DE30 and UK100 hit lowest levels of the month
- OPEC report upbeat for Oil prices
- Latest WASDE report could be key for grains
- Pressure grows on UK PM May. CPI release tomorrow could be key for GBP
We earlier noted that Bitcoin has experienced a sharp decline since hitting an all-time high last Wednesday, but today’s session has seen the market attempt to recover. Price is now higher by some 15% on the day as the Bitcoin bulls don’t appear ready to give up the ghost easily. Elsewhere in the crypto space Dash has surged higher on a positive software upgrade yesterday and the market has today hit its highest level of all-time.
Stock indices have begun the week in the red with the European morning seeing the DE30 and UK100 hit their lowest levels of the month – a technical overview of the DE30 can be found here. There is no major news to suggest that this sell-off is fundamentally led but given the large run higher we’ve had in recent months it could well be a case of some profit-taking.
The latest OPEC report was supportive of oil prices as it revealed that a period with undue oil stocks could be coming to an end. Notice that today’s report was the last one before a semi-annual meeting scheduled for 30 November. Despite this the markets are falling lower with both Brent and WTI in the red on the European close.
The US Department of Agriculture (USDA) unveiled its monthly update on trends among grains which turned out to be conducive to wheat prices but less upbeat for corn prices while soybean did not react significantly. The report showed that wheat ending stocks’ forecast in the 2017/2018 season would be marginally lower than estimated a month ago (0.935 billion bushels vs. 0.96 billion bushels seen in October) mainly due to higher export expectations.
It’s been a relatively quiet day in the FX space with the pound coming under pressure early on following reports that UK PM May has lost the confidence of some members of her party. There were some revelations during the weekend that as much as 40 Conservative members of the British Parliament agreed to sign a letter of no-confidence. Tomorrow’s CPI release could be key for the pound going forward, with the recent rate hike mainly due to the spike higher seen in inflation throughout this year.