Daily Summary: Indices try to recover from losses, BoE hikes rates

• US indices launched today's trading lower, deepening recent declines. However, situation changed later during the session and now major Wall Street indices trade more or less flat on the day

• S&P 500 drops 0.1%, Dow Jones trade flat, Nasdaq gains 0.1% and Russell 2000 drops 0.2%

• European stock market indices finished today's trading lower - German DAX dropped 0.79%, UK FTSE 100 declined 0.43%, French CAC40 moved 0.72% lower and Dutch AEX finished 0.64% down

• Bank of England delivered a 25 basis point rate hike, pushing the main rate to 5.25% - the highest level since the first half of 2008. However, BoE Governor Bailey said that rates are restrictive now and it is having an impact on the economy

• Money markets pared hawkish bets and now BoE peak rate is seen at around 5.75%, down from around 6.00%

• Oil gained after Saudi Arabia announced it will extend 1 million barrel voluntarily cut through September and warned that it may be extended further and even deepened

• ECB Panetta said that risks to the inflation outlook are now more balanced while risks to the economic outlook have shifted to the downside

• US services ISM index dropped from 53.9 to 52.7 in July (exp. 53.0). Employment subindex was a drag as it dropped from 53.1 to 50.7

• Final services PMIs for July from Europe were revised a touch lower for most countries. German reading came in slightly higher at 52.3, compared to 52.0 in flash release

• Chinese services PMI increased from 53.9 in June to 54.1 in July (exp. 52.5)

• US factory orders increased 2.3% MoM in June (exp. 2.2% MoM

• US jobless claims for the last week came in at 227k (exp. 225k) 

• EIA report showed a 14 billion cubic feet build in natural gas inventories, the smallest build since April 2023

• Major cryptocurrencies trade mixed - Bitcoin and Ethereum gain 0.2%, Dogecoin drops 0.7% and Ripple slumps 2.3%

• Energy commodities trade higher - oil gains 2-2.5% while US natural gas prices jump 3.3%

• Precious metals trade mixed in spite of USD weakening - gold trades flat, silver drops 0.4%, platinum declines 0.8% and palladium jumps 0.6%

• CHF and JPY are the best performing major currencies while USD and GBP lag the most

In spite of a 25 basis point rate hike from the Bank of England, GBP has been one of the worst performing major currencies today. Source: xStation5