Three markets to watch next week (23.02.2024)

Solid earnings report from Nvidia helped revive stock market rally this week, allowing S&P 500 to climb to fresh record highs. The next week looks less intense, but there are still some macro releases scheduled that may help move the markets. Be sure to watch US500, NZDUSD and EURCAD in the week ahead!

US500

Wall Street indices surged this week, following release of solid fiscal-Q4 earnings report from Nvidia. S&P 500 futures climbed to fresh record highs above 5,100 pts area, while Nasdaq-100 futures returned above 18,000 pts mark. Earnings stream for the next week is no longer as impressive, but US indices may still move on release of macro data. Among next week's highlights, one can find Conference Board consumer confidence reading (Tuesday, 3:00 pm GMT), Q4 GDP revision (Wednesday, 1:30 pm GMT), monthly PCE report for January (Thursday, 1:30 pm GMT) and manufacturing ISM index for February (Friday, 3:00 pm GMT).

NZDUSD

New Zealand dollar will be on watch next week as Reserve Bank of New Zealand is scheduled to announce a monetary policy decision on Wednesday at 1:00 am GMT. Economists polled by Bloomberg and Reuters expect interest rates to be left unchanged, with the main policy rate staying at 5.50%. The Bank is likely to stay on hold given that growth has disappointed recently and inflation remained above expectations. Money markets do not price in a full 25 basis point rate cut in New Zealand before late-2024.

EURCAD

EURCAD is one of the FX pair that may see some moves next week, especially on Thursday. Traders will be offered  German retail sales reading for January (Thursday, 7:00 am GMT) as well as Canadian Q4 GDP report (Thursday, 1:30 pm GMT). Apart from those, investors will also be served manufacturing PMI from Europe and Canada on Friday, but those will be revisions to flash February data and are unlikely to trigger major market moves. The pair climbed to a monthly high at the beginning of this week but has pulled back slightly later on.