Equities rebound intact as bond yields edge down - 3.1

The Dollar is on backfoot currently. The live dollar index data show the ICE US Dollar index, a measure of the dollar’s strength against a basket of six rival currencies, jumped 0.9% on Friday as Bureau of Economic Analysis reported Personal Consumption Expenditures (PCE) index rose 1.5% over year in January, after 1.3% increase in previous month.

EUR/USD joined GBP/USD continued sliding Friday despite German federal statistical office Destatis report the index of import prices rose 1.9% over month in January after 0.6% increase in previous month, when an increase of 1.1% was forecast. Both are higher against the Dollar currently. AUD/USD accelerated its declining Friday while USD/JPY continued its climbing with both Australian dollar and yen higher against the greenback currently.

Futures on US equity benchmarks are up currently ahead of Institute for Supply Management report of US Manufacturing PMI at 16:00 CET today. Indexes  ended mixed on Friday as the House of Representatives passed President Joe Biden’s $1.9 trillion coronavirus relief package, sending it to Senate. The three main US stock benchmarks recorded returns ranging from -1.6% to +0.6%.

European stock indexes are edging higher currently after ending down on Friday led by basic resources shares. Asian indexes are mostly rising with Nikkei index leading the gains as Japanese manufacturing PMI showed the fastest growth in two years while China’s official figures, that came  out over the weekend, missed forecasts.