Yesterday’s Market Movers

• There was no data out from the UK on Tuesday, however acting IMF chief John Lipsky was in London giving his annual economic assessment on the state of the UK. He said that the state of the recovery was on track but more QE may be needed if growth doesn’t  move in line as the BoE have suggested. Sterling traded comfortable above the 1.6400 levels in London ahead of Thursday’s BoE rate announcement, where an unchanged 50pbs is expected.

Yesterday’s Market Movers

• There was no data out from the UK on Tuesday, however acting IMF chief John Lipsky was in London giving his annual economic assessment on the state of the UK. He said that the state of the recovery was on track but more QE may be needed if growth doesn’t  move in line as the BoE have suggested. Sterling traded comfortable above the 1.6400 levels in London ahead of Thursday’s BoE rate announcement, where an unchanged 50pbs is expected.
• The Euro zone saw figures in the form firstly of European retail sales, where we saw a jump in sales both MoM and YoY. This saw the euro trade ever so slightly higher. It seems that consumers within the Euro zone are ignoring the recent troubles of other EU nations in terms of bailouts and defaults and are going about their own business, which reflected in this set of positive sales figures.
• Following on from European retail sales were German factory orders which came in as expected better than the month prior and year, and being that Germany is the largest of the EU nations and the strongest the figures did little to move the euro against dollar or sterling as many investors will be waiting to see what the ECB moves on the Thursday when they meet to discuss rates and all matters towards the Euro zone.
• The only piece of data from the United States yesterday was from Fed chief Ben Bernake who was speaking in depth regarding all matters towards the US dollar and economy. He touched on rising unemployment being a big and main reason for lower consumer spending.  A slowdown in the recent jobs market is also a worry for the Fed as we saw the lowest number in Non Farm payrolls last Friday of 54,000.
• Rising commodity prices are also being seen as a worry on inflation and are being watched closely by the central bank. Finally the United States debt worries are a major concern for the Fed as within recent weeks crediting rating agencies have put a review on the once Ultra safe AAA+ debt.

Today’s Market Movers

• There is no data out from the UK today to report.
• The eurozone is the busiest of all three economies with three pieces of data to be released firstly coming in the form of German trade balance and industrial production, which both are looking for a slight drop from market expectations.
• European GDP is also released mid morning and is looking for an increase both QoQ and YoY which. These figures, if as expected come in higher we could see the euro trade higher against its major counterparts possibly looking to test the 1.4940 level seen on May 5th with Jean Claude speaking after the rates decision on Thursday.
• The United States only sees one piece of data released this evening in the form of the Fed’s Beige Book. The Beige Book gives a an economic report of 12 federal reserve districts , the survey gives a picture of growth and will be seen as an important report being that the US is struggling recently with its debt, growth of jobs creation and credit rating.