Alleviated Market Concern

The Polish zloty gained today after data showed that retail sales in Poland grew last month, while positive macroeconomic reports from the eurozone and the United States added to strength of higher-yielding currencies. Polish retail sales advanced 14.3 percent in January on an annual basis, following the 8.3 percent increase in December. The median estimate promised a 13.8 percent growth. Poland’s Finance Minister Jacek Rostowski said that outlook for the nation’s economy is “much better” than it was in December. The environment on the Forex market today was positive for currencies of emerging markets as concerns about recession in the eurozone receded, while the US economy continued to show signs of growth. The improving business sentiment in Germany alleviated fears of recession in ...

Fundamental Analysis EUR "Spain is showing the market there’s ample demand for their paper" - Padhraic Garvey, head of developed markets debt strategy at ING Bank NV France and Spain, both downgraded by Standard & Poor’s last week, paid lower borrowing costs on Thursday, compared to their previous auctions, a sign the ECB’s refinancing operation alleviated market concern over the Europe’s debt crisis. USD "You’ve got a gradual improvement in the labor market" - Brian Jones, a senior U.S. economist at Societe Generale The number of Americans claiming for unemployment benefits dropped by 50,000 to 352,000 in the week ended January 14, the lowest level in nearly four years, said the Department of Labor on Thursday. GBP "Right to the end, 2011 was an extremely tough year for UK consumers" ...

The week ahead is likely to be dominated by issues of trust or, to be more precise, a lack of trust with the banking sector likely to be a key focus. If funding pressures cannot be alleviated, there will be the growing threat of a major European bank failure which would put risk appetite under severe pressure and leave the EU Summit deal in tatters. The Summit has to be one of the most bizarre in recent memory. Leaders may be relieved that they have managed to get through this exercise without causing a market meltdown, but it is very difficult to believe that the key players actually think that they have improved the underlying Euro-zone outlook. The meeting was fundamentally a political exercise as this was the only way to cover-up the lack of any real achievement and prevent an even ...

(Reuters) - The euro rose for a fourth straight session against the dollar on Thursday, bolstered by solid demand at the Spanish and French debt auctions, although traders were inclined to view its gains as good selling opportunities. Spain sold 3.75 billion euros of three bonds at the top of the targeted range, although its cost of borrowing was the highest in 14 years and at levels seen as unsustainable for public finances. France also found demand for its sale of 4.35 billion euros of debt in several maturities. "While the rising interest rates that euro zone governments are forced to pay is widely acknowledged as unsustainable, the fact that market demand was strong has for now, alleviated some concerns about government funding issues," said Omer Esiner, chief market analyst, at ...

(Reuters) - The euro rose for a fourth straight session against the U.S. dollar on Thursday, bolstered by solid demand at Spanish and French debt auction, although traders were inclined to view its gains as good selling opportunities. Spain sold 3.75 billion euros of three bonds at the top of the targeted range, although its cost of borrowing was the highest in 14 years and at levels seen as unsustainable for public finances. France also found demand for its sale of 4.35 billion euros of debt in several maturities. "While the rising interest rates that euro zone governments are forced to pay is widely acknowledged as unsustainable, the fact that market demand was strong has for now, alleviated some concerns about government funding issues," said Omer Esiner, chief market analyst, at ...

(Reuters) - The world's top oil consumers decided against releasing more stocks into the market on Thursday, despite high prices still threatening to hinder economic recovery, saying they believed producers have started pumping more. The energy watchdog for the industrialized nations, the International Energy Agency, said not a single one of its 28 members had asked for more oil to be released. That included the United States, one of the leading architects of the first release a month ago. "The IEA also notes a sharp rise in OPEC oil production... However, a number of uncertainties remain which demand vigilance, notably the duration of the Libyan disruption, the future evolution of OPEC supply as well as the final impact of the stock release itself; much of the oil is only now entering ...

The United States and other industrialized nations have not requested a second release of emergency oil supplies, the head of the International Energy Agency said on Thursday, hours before a decision is due to be made. IEA members agreed to release 60 million barrels in emergency stockpiles last month, only the third release in the agency's history, as concern grew in consumer countries that high oil prices were hurting a fragile global economy. Oil prices fell after the release but have since moved higher, raising the possibility the IEA would boost world supplies of oil once again. "No country asked me to release additional barrels," the IEA's executive director, Nobuo Tanaka, told Reuters in an interview. "We will decide probably in a matter of hours." A decision to release stocks ...

Pessimism spread through global financial markets ahead of the U.S. session, where Moody’s announced it downgraded Portugal’s credit rating to junk, while China announced it raised benchmark interest rates by 25 basis points, and now investors are eyeing the ISM services index from the United States, which is expected to show that activities eased in June. Moody’s Investors Services, the rating agency, decided to lower the credit rating of Portugal by four notches to Ba2 from Baa1, which spread fear among investors and reignited the concerns from the European debt crisis, where Moody’s expect Portugal will need a second bailout in order to avoid default. Meanwhile, speculations mounted earlier this week that China was set to raise the benchmark interest rates, where an official ...

Spain attracted solid demand at a bond sale on Wednesday, easing concerns it could be swept up by the contagion hitting other euro zone states, but worries about Greek debt continued to haunt the bloc. In a reminder of the rising political obstacles to solving the euro zone's debt crisis, a member of German Chancellor Angela Merkel's party said he would try to block plans to create a new financial safety net for the 17-nation currency area. That threat came days after an anti-euro party scored strong gains in a Finnish election, stoking fears about a veto of Portugal's pending bailout. Rising expectations that Greece will have to restructure its 325 billion euro ($468 billion) mountain of debt have weighed on the bloc in recent days, raising doubts about whether policymakers can restore ...