On Thursday, world financial markets posted an overall rise. Investors were encouraged by a slight stabilization of oil prices. Thus, in Europe, the British FTSE 100 grew 2.44 percent up to 6,576.51 points, the French CAC 40 advanced 3.71 percent up to 4,265.18 points, and the German DAX added 3.47 percent making 9,848.28 points.
On the Russian floors, the RTS index shot up by 8.78 percent reaching 812.02 points, and the MICEX index advanced 4.5 percent up to 1,547.39 points. The indices increased not only due to more stable oil prices but also due to attempts to resolve the crisis in Ukraine taken at the meeting of Russian, German, French and Ukrainian representatives and talks about possibly cancelling sanctions against Russia.
In the USA, the Dow Jones gained 1.8 percent closing at 17,900.80 points, the S&P 500 grew 1.78 percent up to 2,062.01 points, and the NASDAQ advanced 1.84 percent finishing the trading session at 4,736.19 points.
On the NYMEX, the price of WTI oil futures for February rose by $0.14 and made $48.79 a barrel. On London’s ICE, February futures for oil of mark Brent went down by $0.19 and reached $50.96 a barrel. Nonetheless, experts believe that the current stabilization of oil prices is temporary as there haven’t been any radical changes in the world’s economy or oil demand.
On the Forex market, EUR/USD closed below the 9-year support level and never held at it even for a day, which shows that the ‘old’ daily levels can’t be considered as indicative of the pair’s reversal and targets. It would make more sense now to wait for EUR/USD to renew its lows. Besides, the pair hasn’t yet closed the gap formed at the beginning of the week.
Anna Gorenkova
NordFX Analyst