Market around the world are mostly up. All majore indices in the Far East were up. The Hang Seng in China was up 2.14%, the NIKKEI in Japan was up .7%, and the Straits Time Index was up .64%. In Europe, all indices except the Spanish index were up as well. The FTSE was up .46%, the Dax in Germany was up .4%, and the aforementioned Spanish index was down .01%. All others, again, were up.
Meanwhile, oil has been going up the last two sessions and today appears to continue that trend. Oil is now trading at $70.45 a barrel. It reached a low of just around $66 a barrel last week before inching up toward $70 a barrel. It's up about $2 a barrel in pre market trading.
Part of the reason for the strength this morning in oil may have to do with the weakness of the Dollar. The Dollar looks to open much weaker against most major currencies. It's down 1.14% agains the Euro, down 1.41% against the British Pound, and down .98% against the Yen. Oil is priced in Dollars and so when it weakens that puts upward pressure on oil.
Meanwhile, there's also some breaking news on the merger front.
Cadbury Plc, the confectioner that rejected Kraft Foods Inc.’s bid yesterday, may attract suitors ranging from Nestle SA to Hershey Co. and sell for as much as $21 billion, according to analysts.
The U.K.-based maker of Dairy Milk chocolate and Trident chewing gum spurned Kraft’s $16.7 billion bid as “fundamentally inadequate” and its shares surged past the offer price, suggesting investors are expecting a sweetened proposal from the Northfield, Illinois-based company or a rival offer.
Besides this, the calendar is relatively light for economic data.
This is the first time I've ever seen the Dollar fall against both the Euro and Yen at the same time. Something extremely dollar bearish happened over the weekend.
ReplyDeleteIt has to be China. China has been talking down the dollar over the entire holiday weekend, and last week they were buying gold like nobody's business.