It’s been a good start to the week for equities so far today with major indices managing to build on early morning interest.

What is most impressive about today the rally is the breadth of today’s buying. Most sectors are on the advanced with banks and energy firms leading the way. UK banks such as Lloyds Group and Barclays are amongst the best performers after positive comments from Goldman Sachs, but other sectors are playing their part with pharma and utility stocks on the rise.

Energy stocks are also in favour as crude oil recovers the $70 level despite cautious notes from the IEA. Attacks by Nigerian rebels have contributed to higher energy prices today despite expectations of sluggish demand.

We do have a busy week ahead of us on the economic announcement front so investors appear to be taking their positions ahead of what could promise to be a volatile week.

Any gains made today could easily be wiped out by one of the week’s top level economic announcements.

Dow Jones (Wall Street) Fixed Odds Bet

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Recovering oil prices are helping to push European equities off their lows of the day, while US markets continue to push higher albeit at a slow pace.

Slow seems to be an apt word to describe conditions at the moment. Aside from Monday’s plunge, equities seem to have settled back into the tighter daily ranges that have become the norm over the last couple of months.

The pace of the global meltdown has itself slowed, but judging by today’s US unemployment claims increase, any meaningful recovery will be long and drawn out.

After the frantic days of the first quarter, perhaps a quiet crawl back to growth might be best outcome for the next few years. If offered this outcome at the height of the crisis, it is doubtful that many would have refused it.

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Equities are making a reasonable fist of it today, but volume is low ahead of this afternoons FOMC statement.

The Fed is highly unlikely to change rates, but their statement will be scrutinised down to the last detail as traders look for hints on economic confidence and the speed of any future changes.

US Durable goods orders unexpectedly rose today and coupled with an improved outlook from the OECD, world stock markets have recovered some of Monday’s losses throughout today.

There will be a cap on any gains until the FOMC meeting is out of the way thought, especially in the light of dire news from US new home sales.

If the Fed produces no surprises, US markets could drift meekly into the close. It may be worth waiting for the dust to settle following the FOMC statement then place some trades taking advantage of lower volatility such as Fixed Odds Barrier Range Trades.

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Equities stabilised in early trading today as resource stocks bounced after taking the lion’s share of the selling yesterday.

Commodities, especially crude oil are a barometer of global economic sentiment at the moment, so the afternoon retreat is telling. Bereft of any positive catalysts, markets starting to stumble last week.

Now the news flow is churning out some heavy data, but unfortunately it is not good news. US house prices fell by 6.8% in April and existing home sales fell by 3.0%. The US housing market at the epicentre of the credit crunch has stopped cliff diving but prices are still marching downwards.

Tomorrow promises to be a very busy day with the UK inflation report due as well as US new homes sales and the FOMC rate statement. No change is expected, but traders are baying for clarity from the embattled clarity.

Rumours are rife of rate hikes before the year end, undoubtedly contributing to interbank lending creeping up again, which is in turn hindering any chance of meaningful recovery in the US housing market.

Tomorrow’s FOMC statement could see some volatility increase in the dollar with a dovish statement from the Fed putting more pressure on the greenback. This could be good news for the pound.

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Markets are on the back foot once again with commodities and resource stocks feeling the brunt of the selling.

The World Bank has dimmed the lights on the nascent global economic recovery after predicting that progress would be subdued and economic output will drop by 3%.

Add to this the stalemate over North Korea’s nuclear ambitions and you get a very jittery market.

After rising by more than 40% from the lows of March, the recovery in equities has run out of steam. Potential catalysts are thin on the ground with the week’s data flow and earnings calendar bare this week.

Crude Oil is trading below $67 a barrel, making BP and Shell amongst the biggest fallers on the FTSE today. Banks are actually holding relatively steady, but this could soon change if the resource sector rout spreads to the wider market.

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The bulls have lost their swagger and after a week long stalemate, the bears appear to be winning recovery debate.

Financial markets have now broken out of last week’s unusually tight trading range, but unfortunately this break out is going in the opposite direction to the one most people want.

Deflation is back on the agenda after US CPI increased slightly less than forecast. As a symptom of this lower growth, scenario treasuries are back in demand and oil has slumped below $70.

Markets are close to major technical levels. S&P 500 futures are floating just above the 900 level and the Dow Jones is trading around the 8,500 point.

The FTSE is feeling the impact of some heavyweight stocks such as United Utilities going ex dividend and the Sainsbury’s cash call.

UK plc is on the defensive despite evidence that the rise in UK unemployment has eased. The pound is down against most currencies, especially the euro.

EUR/GBP Fixed Odds

The euro has recovered against the pound today, but the medium term trend is still against the European single currency.

A Fixed Odds No touch trade predicting that the EUR/GBP won’t touch £0.855 at any time in the next 7 days could return 225%.

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Please find below the Financial Fixed Odds report from David Evans, market analyst at BetOnMarkets.

Markets have stabilised today, but the buyers have not been rushing forward in significant numbers to recover much of yesterday’s sell off.

Investors are still wary after the first meaningful trading session in nearly 10 days resulted in heavy selling.

Markets reached a standoff last week, but yesterday’s slump still does not settle the argument.

US housing starts have recovered well from an extremely depressed position and this has given markets some hope today.

Today UK CPI fell to 2.2% from 2.3%, but this was still above the expected level of 2%.

After a weak start to the trading day, sterling has reverse early declines on speculation that the Bank of England may have to raise rates sooner than it would ideally want to.

This website content does not constitute investment advice. No individual contributor, contributing company nor Online-Spread-Betting.com accept any responsibility for any use that may be made of the content.

Please find below the Financial Fixed Odds report from David Evans, market analyst at BetOnMarkets.

Global equities are firmly in negative territory today, but at least we are getting a meaningful day’s action.

Assuming markets don’t recover; today will the first time since June 4th that the S&P 500 has closed 1% higher or lower. Markets will finally have broken out of the trading range that has restricted trading over the last two weeks.

Traders are questioning whether the talk of green shoots has been too premature and too optimistic. There is no doubting that the all-out free falling has abated, but this does not automatically mean that a recovery is imminent. Just that apocalypse has been averted.

Risk appetite is waning as money flows back into US treasuries, helped by supportive comments from the Russia regarding the strength of the dollar as a reserve currency.

Crude Oil, often seen as a dollar hedge is pulling back towards the $70 marker.

The euro is feeling the brunt of the selling after credit conditions worsened and unemployment increased more than expected.

EUR/GBP Fixed Odds Trade

The Euro has been hit hard recently and that trend could continue over the next few days. A One Touch Fixed Odds trade predicting that EUR/GBP will touch €0.84 by the close of play tomorrow could return 249%.

This website content does not constitute investment advice. No individual contributor, contributing company nor Online-Spread-Betting.com accept any responsibility for any use that may be made of the content.

Please find below the Fixed Odds report from David Evans, market analyst at BetOnMarkets.

Equities are once again dead in the water with no meaningful moves in either direction on all the world’s major stock markets.

Markets have gone from extreme volatility to dead calm this week.

The FTSE’s weekly trading range was just 135, excluding Christmas, that is the lowest range since May 2008.

Incredibly, you have to go back as far as October 2007 to find a weekly trading range as tight as this one for the Dow Jones (again excluding Christmas).

In addition, the New York Stock Exchange recorded its lowest volume excluding holiday sessions twice this week. It’s not as though the bad news has stopped, it’s just become more manageable, almost predictable.

FX markets have offered more action though with the pound reversing recent gains made against the euro and dollar.

Recent data showed that 1 in 10 of the 10 million UK households are in negative equity. To put that in perspective though, 3 in 10 of the 50 million US households are in negative equity.

This website content does not constitute investment advice. No individual contributor, contributing company nor Online-Spread-Betting.com accept any responsibility for any use that may be made of the content.

Please find below the Fixed Odds report from David Evans, market analyst at BetOnMarkets.

Equities are making small gains today, though most world markets are yet to extend beyond the week’s trading range.

There appears to be a standoff between those who believe higher oil prices and the prospect of higher interest rates by year end are indicators of the worst being over.

On the other hand the pessimists believe that growth will continue to falter and higher oil prices will bring the stagflation monster out of hiding.

The optimists have scored a point today with US jobs data topping analysts’ estimates and retails sales rising for the first time in three months. However it will take a meaningful breakout of the recent trading range before it can be said that either the bulls or the bears have got the upper hand.

Despite being relatively old news, today’s strength in sterling has been attributed to the NIESR declaration the British recession may already over.

The pound has recovered more of the ground lost last week against the dollar and has continued to make multi month highs against the euro and Japanese Yen.

Sterling has been one of the strongest currencies over the last month, but there is still a long way to go if the pound is to reach pre-Northern Rock levels from almost two years ago.

Also see FX spread betting.

This website content does not constitute investment advice. No individual contributor, contributing company nor Online-Spread-Betting.com accept any responsibility for any use that may be made of the content.