Stock Market Performance Analysis: Focus on Fed President Speech and ECB Meeting, Bitcoin Folds

Finance

Of Laura Bonadies e Chiara Di Cristofaro

Investors are looking to the speech that the Fed president will give to the US Congress in the afternoon, while attention remains high in view of the ECB meeting. Piazza Affari supported by banks and energy companies, differential between BTp and Bund at 138 basis points. Bitcoin folds after records

3′ reading

(Il Sole 24 Ore Radiocor) – Le European stock exchanges are moving into positive territory after a cautious start. In the meeting of Tuesday 5 March, the FTSE MIB it reached and exceeded 33 thousand points, the highest since May 2008. Investors’ attention is entirely focused on the speech that the president of the Fed, Jerome Powell, will give to the US Congress in the afternoon. Another highlight of the week is the ECB meeting on Thursday 7 March: the market expects interest rates to remain unchanged and that Frankfurt will publish new projections which should indicate lower estimates for this year on both growth and inflation in the Eurozone. Overseas, Wall Street closed the day before the session in negative territory (Dow Jones at -1.04%) on the day in which Donald Trump officially became the Republican candidate for the White House ahead of the American elections in November.

Among the European indices, the best is theIBEX 35 of Madrid, also good FTSE MIB of Milan and theAEX of Amsterdam, more cautious the DAX 30 of Frankfurt and the CAC 40 Paris.

In Milan, banks and energy companies did well, with Tim leading the way

In Piazza Affari, a generally positive tone for the banking sector. It places itself at the top of the list Telecom Italia followed by Inwit, Tenaris and energy stocks. Opposite front for Brunello Cucinelli e Leonardo – Finmeccanica which is losing ground in the wake of rumors of a new M&A operation with Fincantieri . Not included in the main price list, also worth mentioning That after the presentation of the 2023 accounts and the industrial plan.

Euro little moved against the dollar, Bitcoin retraces after records. Gold down slightly

Limited movements on the currency in theeuro/dollar waiting for Powell and the ECB meeting. Bitcoin is falling and, after exceeding the threshold of 69,000 dollars, sharply retraced downwards, returning to the 65,000 dollar area. Also slightly decreasing They which after the historic high reached at 2,145.40 dollars.

Oil prices rebound, expectations for US inventories

They move upwards crude oil prices after the recent weakness, with signs of a decrease in supply with production cuts prevailing over fears about demand growth in China and the USA. On Sunday the OPEC+ countries announced the extension of production cuts of 2.2 million barrels per day until the end of the second quarter and the announcement created some tension on the markets, particularly Asian ones, together with the news of the attacks on oil tankers by Houthi militiamen in the Red Sea. Official data on inventories in the United States are expected in Wednesday’s session, after the API recorded an increase of 423 thousand barrels in reserves, an increase lower than market estimates.

Spread at lowest since January 2022 at 138 basis points

It moves slightly downwards the spread between BTp and Bund which updates the lows from January 2022 earned in the closing session of Tuesday 5 March. The yield differential between the benchmark ten-year BTp (ISIN IT0005560948) and the German equivalent maturity moves around 138 basis points, compared to 139 points at the closing date the day before. The yield of the benchmark ten-year BTp was stable, marking a first position at 3.70%, stable at yesterday’s closing levels.

Tokyo follows Wall Street caution, Nikkei closes fractionally lower (-0.02%)

Closing at practically unchanged levels for the Tokyo Stock Exchange which supported the weakness of the US stock markets and took a breather after the rally of the last few weeks which brought the Nikkei Index to the highest level of the last 34 years. At the end of the session, the Nikkei reference index reached 40,090.78 points, with a decrease of 0.02% compared to the previous session. The Topix Index, however, closed slightly higher, ending trading with an increase of 0.39%, settling at 2,730.67 points.

Controversial session for Chinese stock markets

Chinese stock markets closed a highly volatile session with mixed results following the release of the Dragon’s growth target of “around 5%” for 2024, announced by Prime Minister Li Qiang at the opening of the work of the National People’s Congress, the legislative branch of Parliament: the Shanghai Composite index lost 0.26%, to 3,039.93 points, while that of Shenzhen rose by 0.22%, to 1,722.05. Li, among the various topics touched upon, indicated an ambitious series of objectives with respect to the current condition of the economy, to be achieved with measures far from the ‘bazooka’ urged by analysts: the budget deficit was brought back to 3% from 3, 8% in 2023, while for consumer prices there is a target of 3% when the country has been grappling with an insidious deflationary spiral for some months.

The Hong Kong stock market closed trading down 2.6% in the Hang Seng index, marking its biggest decline since January. On the Hong Kong list, pharmaceutical stocks performed badly, while the sub-index of the technology sector fell by 4.3%.

• Chiara Di Cristofaro

  Expert Radiocor editor

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2024-03-06 08:48:45
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