Oil waves red flag at bulls, Syriza prepare for key debt-decider tomorrow

On the back of resurgent oil, and the bullish sentiment that has worked its way through the markets today, the Dow Jones is up nearly 1%, despite US factory orders falling 3.4% in December.

There will be big news after the bell as Disney announces its latest earnings release; investors will likely be more interested in what is to come and with a year stacked with big blockbusters from Marvel and the Star Wars franchise, things are looking bright for the House of Mouse.

Oil was a dominant force today, as Brent Crude managed to hang on to its $56 per barrel mark, if not quite as robustly as it did this morning. With this and copper maintaining their third and fourth day of gains respectively, the FTSE continued to begin its February in style. Afren appears to be slowly running out of steam, as the rapid growth from this morning began to fall off with the stock potentially hitting a ceiling for now.

It was a busy day for the Eurozone, as contradictory statements began to arise about the likelihood of a Greek debt agreement. With Varoufakis in Italy, it was announced that he is to visit Draghi tomorrow and Germany’s Schauble on Thursday, the latter of whom has been pretty hostile towards Syriza in the past 2 weeks. These will be the two most important meetings so far for the Greek finance minister, as Syriza will need to secure solid support from the ECB if it is to overcome the obstacle that is Angela Merkel. However rumours have begun to circulate that the central bank will be unwilling to accept the ‘debt swap’ proposal, and Merkel has already stated she thinks negotiations will go on for months, a stark contrast to the quick deal Varoufakis mentioned yesterday.

Yet there is (Greek) hope as reports suggest the EU commission is confident a deal can be made, with Juncker acting as a mediator between Greece and its creditors. It might be in the best interests of Varoufakis and co to find an agreement soon, and perhaps kick the debt haircut can down the road, as news leaked that three Greek banks have received emergency funding from the country’s central bank due to a cash exodus following the Syriza election victory.

Despite having an overall strong January, gold is still a relative outcast, as it either suffers under a dominant dollar, or it struggles when the euro rebounds. After appearing to consolidate at $1280 per ounce this morning, the invasion of bulls into the euro, following the overall reassuring statements coming out of key Eurozone mouths, has caused the metal to slip back to around $1265.