Summary:

• Bitcoin struggles ahead of the resistance level at $9300

• European stocks post moderate gains at the beginning of new week

• Investors await PCE inflation data from the United States

The beginning of the European session was calm just as it was the case for the Asian trading. US dollar is the top gaining G10 currency ahead of the inflation data release. On the other hand, Antipodean currencies along with the GBP are the biggest underperformers. Precious metals trade lower along with crude. Zinc posts a significant gain. 

We have already written several times about the Venezuelan unconventional way to bypass sanctions imposed by the United States. The way has been the Petro, the Venezuelan own digital currency backed by crude oil, which has helped the South American country raise over $3 billion according to the latest statement announced by President Nicolas Maduro.

T-Mobile US, a company controlled by the Deutsche Telekom, has announced long expected takeover of Sprint Corp. The deal is said to be worth $26.5 billions. Two parties have agreed to settle transaction in stock. Let us recall that the earlier attempt to perform this merger failed about 5 months ago.

The beginning of this week trading has been quite calm despite upbeat developments taking place in North and South Korea at the end of the past week. Let us remind that both leaders pledged to denuclearize of the Korean Peninsula vowing to bring a formal end to the Korean War.

The US dollar just had the best week in months and traders wonder if that could be a return to a “strong dollar” environment. A lot could be clarified in the first week of May. First of all we have the FOMC meeting and even if that doesn’t change much we will have important data every day!