Summary:
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Sizable gains seen in US indices
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US CB index misses expectations; housing starts fall by 8.7%
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S&P500 back above the 50% fib retracement at 2827
There’s green across the board for US stock markets not long after the opening bell with gains of almost 1% seen in most benchmarks. There’s no clear outperformance in the US indices with the moves in the US30, US100 and US500 all remarkably similar. The risk-on mood can be seen in the volatility index (VOLX on xStation) falling by almost 5%.
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It’s been a bright start to US stocks as the markets look to recover Friday’s declines. Source: xStation
On the data front there’s not too much by the way of market-moving releases to note, with the main figures coming from the US on both consumer confidence and the property sector. For the month of March US consumer confidence came in much worse than forecast with a reading of 124.1 vs 132.5 expected. This represents a big slide from the 131.4 prior while the present situation index declined to 160.6 from 173.5. Expectations were also worse than expected coming in at 99.8 vs 103.4
The CB consumer confidence fell sharply once more this month, although a recovery in the latest UOM release sends conflicting signals. Source: XTB Macrobond
Housing starts for February came in worse than expected at 11.6M vs 12.1M forecast, although a fair chunk of the miss can be explained by the prior being revised higher by 0.43M to now read 12.73M. Building permits were not far from the 13.1M forecast, printing 13.0M. The prior read is now 13.2M after originally coming in at 13.5M.
US housing starts fell for the month of February, but much of the drop can be explained by a sizable upwards revision to the prior. Both housing starts and permits are back to pretty much flat year-on-year. Source: Bloomberg
The price action in US stocks has been choppy lately to say the least, with no real clear longer term trend. Rather the market seems to be oscillating around in a fairly good sized range, presenting opportunities on both the long and short side. After falling below the 2800 level yesterday, the US500 formed a base around 2790 and after this support held, price has been pushed back higher. Taking fibs from last Thursday’s high of 2866, the market is now back above the 50% retracement level at 2827 and a move above the 61.8% at 2836 could lead to another tilt at 2865.
The bounce in the US500 has seen the market recapture the 50% fib at 2827 after breaking firmly above the 41.4% at 2821 on the opening bell. Source: xStation
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