Asian share markets are still stumbling following some potential progress on the rare earth US-China trade war while local economic releases and the latest RBA minutes are not really supporting more rate cuts for now. Despite this the Australian dollar fell back again to its Friday night lows as the USD lifted against most of the majors.
Oil markets are still depressed with Brent crude holding around the $63USD per barrel level while gold continues to soar higher as it lifts well above the $4100USD per ounce level:
Mainland Chinese share markets are lifting slightly going into the close with the Shanghai Composite up nearly 0.2% after a poor morning session while the Hang Seng Index is down more than 1% at 25595 points. Japanese stock markets reopened after a long weekend with a big slump with the Nikkei 225 looking to close more than 2% lower at 46812 points with the USDPY pair steadying but now pulling back bleow the 152 level:
Australian stocks were the odd ones out and were up slightly with the ASX200 closing 0.2% higher at 8899 points while the Australian dollar has again rolled over to almost match its Friday night low below the 65 cent level against USD:
S&P and Eurostoxx futures are rising slightly as we head into the London session with the S&P500 four hourly chart showing the market wanting to get back on track after the slump on Friday night, but nowhere near out of the woods yet:
The economic calendar includes UK unemployment, the closely watched German ZEW survey then a slew of speeches from Fed members.