Market reviews

The calendar is fairly light Stateside with Monday’s ISM services PMI the only real top-tier data, offering little scheduled “spark” on the USD side of the equation this week.

China’s weaker-than-expected non-manufacturing PMI, released just hours ago, have sparked a flight to safety.

Although the US dollar index is now easing away from overbought conditions, it’s still trading around a two-month high.

The drama of the fiscal situation in the world’s biggest economy continues to be front and centre in the minds of investors.

It remains to be seen whether or not Bitcoin’s recent gains marks a sustained reversal from the series of lower highs and lower lows since mid-April, or whether it’s merely a false break.

Litecoin is boasting a month-to-date advance of 2.5% at the time of writing, faring better than the likes of Bitcoin, Ether, and other larger cryptos, which have dropped so far in May.

Bitcoin is now stuck in a downtrend, having posted a series a lower highs and lower lows so far this month.

After making a run towards the $30k mark, a possibility cited in our crypto article last week, Bitcoin has since slumped.

Although on course for back-to-back weekly gains, oil’s advance for this week was significantly pared after Russia hinted that another OPEC+ supply cut may not be forthcoming at its early June meeting.

The global oil benchmark is on course to post a weekly advance of over 3%, ending a run of four straight weekly declines.

As mentioned in last Friday’s article, “Brent’s recent rebound is unlikely to be sustained …”. Sure enough, the global oil benchmark is unwinding some of its technical rebound, as demand-side fears continue to fester across markets.

Brent’s recent rebound is unlikely to be sustained as long as negative sentiment continues to cloud oil markets.

Spot gold is attempting to stage a slight recovery ahead of the weekend, after being dealt a further blow by Thursday’s upward revisions to US GDP.

Gold has been dragged below the psychologically-important $2,000 level this week due to optimism surrounding a US debt deal, while markets also ramped up bets of a Fed rate hike in June.

The longer that spot gold can keep its head above $2k amid sustained inflows into bullion-backed ETFs, the greater the chances of the precious metal revisiting its all-time high.

Gold posted a one-year high this week, enabled by market expectations that US rates have peaked, while persistent fears over US banking turmoil have bid up safe haven assets.

Nvidia enjoyed a huge surge in its share price after its results were released after the US stock market closed.

US tech stocks have been on a seemingly unrelenting uptrend for much of this year. The NQ100_m, which tracks the Nasdaq 100 index, is edging higher even after the Nasdaq 100’s gain of 1.2% yesterday (Wednesday, May 17^th) fuelled by optimism that the US can avert a first-ever default.

Disney’s shares fell by 4.9% in Wednesday’s post-market session as the company released its latest quarterly earnings after US markets closed yesterday.

The iPhone maker is set to release its latest quarterly earnings after US markets close on Thursday, May 4^th.