Europe started to give back a sliver of yesterday’s mega-gains, with the Dow Jones looking likely to follow suit.
Initially opening higher, the FTSE found itself down half a percent at lunchtime. That wasn’t enough to take it back under 6000, however, the UK index clinging onto the brunt of Tuesday’s growth.
One would think that the latest jobs report played a part in undermining the FTSE – after all, 856,500 people filed for unemployment in April. However, the markets have largely been apathetic about jobs data in the last month or so; plus the FTSE 250 was actually up 0.9%, with sterling also climbing half a percent against the dollar (something that will have hurt the blue chip index).
More likely is that investors are merely struggling to justify any immediate growth after the triple-digits gains managed on Monday, as news broke of a positive human trial for an experimental covid-19 vaccine.
For example, the losses extended to the Eurozone, with the DAX down 0.6% and the CAC falling 0.7%, despite a pair of far better than forecast ZEW economic sentiment readings for Germany and the region as a whole.
Looking ahead to the US open and the Dow Jones is facing a minor 40-ish point decline when trading gets underway stateside – nothing compared to the 900-point-plus surge seen yesterday evening.
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