Morning wrap (24.04.2023)

• Indices from Asia-Pacific traded lower at the beginning of a new week. Nikkei, S&P/ASX 200 and Nifty 50 traded flat, Kospi dropped 0.9% and indices from China traded 0.3-1.3% lower

• DAX futures and S&P 500 futures trade slightly lower

• Russia warned that it will terminate Black Sea grain deal if G7 moves to impose a total ban on exports

• BoJ Governor Ueda said that inflation forecasts strong and close to 2% for bank to consider changing its yield curve control mechanism

• Financial Times reports that United States asked South Korea not to increase chip sales to China if chips of US company Micron get banned as part of Chinese investigation

• Cryptocurrencies traded mostly sideways over the weekend. Small gains can be seen today - Bitcoin gains 0.8%, Ethereum adds 0.3% and Dogecoin jumps 1.2%

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

• Precious metals pull back amid USD strengthening. Gold drops 0.2%, silver trades 0.7% lower and platinum plunges 2.3%

• Energy commodities trade lower as well - oil drops 1.2% while US natural gas prices decline 0.5%

Brent (OIL) is inches away from closing a bearish price gap triggered by an unexpected OPEC+ output cut. Source: xStation5