It seems that the Dow Jones is becoming divorced from the European indices, the US index’s record high-hitting run failing to inspire the same energy in its continental peers.
Without much data on the agenda – it’s all saved for tomorrow, with UK retail sales and the flash PMIs for February – the European indices snoozed through their alarms.
At most the FTSE fell 0.2%, knocking it the wrong side of 6,700. Since Monday’s over-eager gains, the FTSE has spent the week chipping away at that growth, though at present the bulk of its surge is still intact.
Sterling was a similarly slow out of the gates. The pound added 0.2% against the dollar, reversing most of the US retail sales-led slump seen on Thursday, but failed to move against the euro.
Though tomorrow will be indicative of how the UK economy has held up under this latest set of restrictions, and therefore will impact the performance of the FTSE and pound, the next big moment for the pair is Monday, when the government reveals its road out of Lockdown 3.0. Until then, the FTSE may continue to drift.
The Eurozone was equally unbothered this Thursday. The DAX was unchanged at a 2-week low a fraction above 13,900, while the CAC shed a handful of points.
At the moment the Dow Jones is looking to pull back from yesterday’s record close, with an 80 point decline returning it to 31,530. Where it ends up by closing time is a different matter; the Dow has repeatedly found the will to eke out a fresh high.
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