- After yesterday’s great session on Wall Street, during which the Nasdaq 100 index rose almost 1.4%, the DJIA rose 0.3% and the S&P 500 rose another 0.6% today, US index futures traded slightly lower in pre-opening trade. Benchmarks from Europe are also losing, although volatility is very low
- In the Asian session, China’s Hang Seng retreats another 0.6% today and has managed to erase much of the upward movement of January 13; Chinese index contracts are losing. The Nikkei gained nearly 0.8% thanks to the strength of technology companies, but South Korea’s KOSPI retreats more than 1%.
- Precious metals are mostly losing, with palladium retreating the most, over 1% today. Gold is trading down slightly, after recent gains. Agricultural raw materials are trading slightly lower.
- NATGAS opened 12% lower after the rollback and has been losing slightly since. Oil also retreated nearly 1.5% following the rollback and has since been losing, Optimism in China has declined despite the latest comments from Chinese industry representatives and the central bank:
- PBoC Representative: “We will expand the scope and scale of liquidity tools to finance stock purchases at the appropriate time.”
- Vice Chairman of the Chinese Financial Regulator: “We will encourage major state-owned insurers to allocate 30% of their newly generated premium incomes to stock investments.”
- Chairman of the Chinese Securities Regulator: “Every year, state-owned insurance companies will provide at least hundreds of billions of yuan in new, long-term capital for the stock market.”
- Chairman of the Chinese Securities Regulator: “The current dividend yield of the CSI 300 index has reached 3%, which is significantly higher than the yield on 10-year treasury bonds.”
Change in U.S. crude inventories by API (in a million barrels): 1M vs. 2.6M previously
- Gasoline inventories: 3.2M vs. 5.39M previously
- Distillate stocks 1.9M vs. 4.88M previously
- Cushing oil reserves: 0.5M (Forecast -, Previous 0.573M)