Ethereum price Today – EU/US Manufacturing Data, Construction Spending
The US dollar continued to improve on Friday not only major currency pairs like the AUD/USD pair which fell by more than two per cent on Friday were on the move, but also emerging markets. While pairs like USD/ZAR or USD/TRY moved up only slowly, the USD/INR rate spiked by more than two per cent.
While cryptos were again under pressure over the weekend with Bitcoin briefly traded at just over $43k, while Ethereum received support only slightly above $1,300, by Monday morning prices seemed to have stabilized for the time being. Given the relative weakness of Ethereum the Bitcoin/Ethereum rate reached a new six-weeks high.
Sentiment in the stock markets was quite mixed at the start of the week. While US index futures started upbeat, and European indices like the Germany 30 recovered from the low on Friday, indices in China like the China A50 continued to face pressure and traded around those index levels seen on Friday, when the index hit a 3-1/2 weeks low.
On Monday manufacturing PMI statistics will be released for multiple European countries including Germany, France and Italy, while in the US also the ISM Manufacturing PMI index will be released. Also on Monday consumer price index (CPI) data is expected from Germany and Italy.
Gold
Precious metals like gold, silver, platinum and others were again under pressure on Friday. While rates came down from the recent peak, now the stronger dollar could have in theory pressured prices lower. Gold prices fell to the lowest level since June 2020. Meanwhile for the second week in a row the Commitment of Traders (COT) report, which is released weekly by the US CFTC indicated a sizable drop in speculative positions on gold futures contracts, which are now down to 215.7 thousand from 251.4 thousand just two weeks earlier.
Some of the most important statistics about the economy could come in towards the end of the week, when on Friday the non-farm payrolls, unemployment rate statistic and trade balance will be released for the US.
WTI Oil
Oil prices closed the week in the green, despite a noticeable drop occurring on Friday. By Monday morning oil prices recovered again thanks to reports on progress on the US stimulus package.
In terms of oil stockpile data, this week as usual the American Petroleum Institute (API) publishes its weekly statistical bulletin which includes data up to February 26, on Tuesday. Then the Energy Information Administration (EIA) releases its datasets, which include crude oil, gasoline and distillate statistics on Wednesday.
The key event this week however will be the meeting of the OPEC+ countries on Thursday. Driven by the strong improvement in oil prices it remains to be seen what measures the block will decide. In the past weeks it was rumoured that Saudi Arabia would prefer to keep the current strict production quotas, while some other countries, especially Russia would prefer to ease the restrictions in place. Given the continued rise of oil prices a change might indeed come sooner than expected. However, given the significant reliance on the oil industry Saudi Arabia in the past oftentimes targeted prices which are still above the current level where Brent crude is traded.
US 500
While the US 500 and US 30 index extended their losses on Friday, closing at the lowest level in almost a month, the US Tech 100 index, which was previously stronger affected by the sell-off managed to close moderately higher on Friday. Still, over the past two weeks the tech-oriented index lost more than six per cent of its value.
Sector-wise the performance was also rather positive in tech-oriented industries like the chip sector (US Semiconductors ETF +1.95%) and for biotech stocks (US Biotech -0.08%). Given the plunge in gold prices the sharp drop affecting gold mining companies (Global Gold Miners x2 ETF -7.39%) should come hardly as a surprise.
Still some company earnings can be expected this week, like those from Zoom Video and Novavax on Monday and Sea and Target on Tuesday.
Ethereum price Today – EU/US Manufacturing Data, Construction Spending
