Market Snapshot – Equities Buoyed By Stronger Dollar

Stock Markets Move Higher

The stock markets seem to be well and truly back to their bullish ways as the major stock markets in Asia rose higher and this buoyed the European stock markets as well. Just a few weeks back, the dollar was down in the dumps and it seemed to weigh on the stock markets. The news of threats from North Korea also dominated the stock markets and the picture looked pretty bleak for the global stock markets and those in Europe in particular as well as the news of QE tapering from the ECB dominated the markets to a great extent. But we have seen the dollar on the rebound and this has helped the US stock markets to recover and post new highs and the effect of this bullishness is also being felt in the other stock markets as well.

Manufacturing Data comes in stronger

The ISM Manufacturing PMI data from the US was the only piece of economic data of note for today and that came in much stronger than what was expected. This has helped the dollar to hold steady as the independence vote in Catalonia continues to haunt the euro and we have seen the euro struggling since morning. It is going to be an important first week of the month and the dollar seems to have started the month and the week on the right note. It remains to be seen whether the dollar bulls can build on this during the course of the week.