Christmas cheer lingered as Eurozone falls behind

Whilst still clinging to the positivity gained from yesterday, a day light on economic news led many of the markets to remain flat on this last Friday before Christmas.

The FTSE, which is close to reaching its biggest weekly rise in 2 years, spent much of the day flat, until a late afternoon rally from oil dragged the UK index higher. Due to a mixture of resurgent energy companies like Afren and Tullow Oil, and the best, Black Friday-inspired, UK sales month for 27 years, the FTSE firmly its recent woes behind it for an emphatic close to the week.

After a triumphant Thursday the US markets opened a little wearier, and warier, this afternoon, as the Dow Jones started relatively flat after yesterday’s 500 point surge. With no news of its own to speak of, and little in the way of game-changing global figures, it is unsurprising that the US indices would open slightly quieter this Friday. However, with the Dow maintaining these high levels, it could only take one or two significant pieces of good news for the index to finally (and we mean finally) breach the 18000 level.

After spending much of the day at just below $60 per barrel, at the US bell oil began to rally, as it has done for much of the week. There is something about the US open that has been appealing to oil investors; however, crude oil has always failed to translate these afternoon rallies into strong closes, so it is unlikely that this quiet Friday will prove any different as oil heads for its fourth week of declines.

Whilst the other worldwide markets spent the day at worst remaining flat and at best continuing to ride the Christmas bump, the Eurozone indices couldn’t keep the pace. After opening the morning strong, the DAX et al. began to fall away as the Italian banks showed heavy declines and the Eurozone current account came in over 7 billion euros less than expected. With no significant news coming out of the EU Economic Summit, i.e. no firmer comment from Draghi on QE, the Eurozone couldn’t share the Christmas cheer found elsewhere in the world.

Finally, as manufacturers in Russia face a ‘bloodbath’ according to Nissan chief Carlos Ghosn, the rouble managed to hang onto the coat-tails of Putin’s calming speech yesterday, spending the day stable around 60 roubles per dollar. However, words can only go so far, and the Russian economy will need some help soon if it is to begin a recovery.