Following the previous day’s strong rally in stocks, a day of quiet trading mostly brought consolidation to the markets.
- Most markets went sideways in quiet trading yesterday, with a few exceptions. Major cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin and Ethereum fell strongly, silver rose, and agricultural commodities such as wheat and corn fell.
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- In the Forex market, we see a strong US dollar, and continued weakness in the Japanese yen. This puts a bullish USD/JPY at the center of today’s Forex market, which can be expected to be more active today as the UK returns from its long weekend holiday.
- Over 1.2 million new coronavirus cases were confirmed yesterday globally, an all-time high by far. The USA, the UK, Portugal, Greece and France all reported record daily national highs.
- Data continues to suggest the omicron coronavirus variant, while considerably more infectious, has notably milder effects than previous coronavirus strains, with an estimated 30% to 70% reduction in the probability of hospitalization. This is potentially very good news for both health and economy, so stock markets have been bullish. The S&P 500 Index rose strongly Monday, ending the session near 4800. The odds are positive that we will see a continuing rise in the S&P 500 Index over the coming days.
- Last week saw the highest number of new confirmed coronavirus cases recorded globally since the start of the pandemic a little over two years ago.
- It is estimated that 57.4% of the world’s population has received at least one dose of a coronavirus vaccination.
- Total confirmed new coronavirus cases worldwide stand at over 283.2 million with an average case fatality rate of 1.92%.
- The rate of new coronavirus infections appears to now be increasing most quickly in Argentina, Australia, Canada, Cyprus, Ethiopia, France, Greece, Iceland, Italy, Kenya, Malta, Montenegro, Nigeria, Portugal, Spain, Switzerland, the UAE, and the USA.
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