Sea of red for European stock indices despite S&P 500 topping 5,000 mark

Chris Beauchamp IG

'While several US stock indices are trading in new record highs, their European peers find it difficult to keep up', says Axel Rudolph, Senior Market Analyst at online trading platform IG.

US indices surge to new record highs but FTSE 100 tumbles

"While the Nasdaq 100 and S&P 50 are making new record highs, the latter topping the 5,000 mark, European stock indices found it difficult to keep up and have had a slightly negative end to the week. The FTSE 100 in particular suffered a third straight day of losses ahead of next week's UK unemployment, inflation, Q4 GDP and retail sales data."

Oil price rise likely to continue into next week

"While US natural gas prices tanked to a 12% weekly fall amid near-record production, the oil price rallied by over 5%. The rejection of ceasefire proposals between the Israeli Defence Force and Hamas concerned investors regarding possible supply disruptions and led to the price surge which is likely to continue if tensions remain high in the region. Last week's inflows into the US dollar have given way to some outflows in the course of this week during which several Fed members have re-iterated the Fed's cautious stance regarding rate cuts."

Author

Chris Beauchamp

Chris Beauchamp has been with IG for four years, and in that time has become a regular commentator and analyst for the financial press and TV, with appearances on all the major financial channels as well as the BBC and Sky News.

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