European Open Market Briefing – 06/10/2017 – by Arjun Lakhanpal

In European Equity Markets  Spanish stocks rebounded on Thursday from heavy losses in the previous session driven by escalating tensions over Catalonia, leading gains across European indexes. Spain’s ended the session up 2.5 percent, led by its banking stocks, as worries over Catalonia eased. The pan-European STOXX 600 index index closed 0.2 percent lower, while Germany’s DAX was flat, off the record high it reached on Wednesday. Shares in Banco Sabadell rose 6.2 percent on news the bank’s board would meet to discuss moving their headquarters out of Catalonia’s capital city, Barcelona. Utilities were led higher by French power company EDF, which gained 3.3 percent after an upgrade to “buy” at Jefferies.

In Currency Markets the U.S. dollar gained on Thursday as data pointed to solid U.S. growth, though the dollar index held under seven-week highs due to caution over how much Friday’s employment report for September will be impacted by recent hurricanes. The dollar index against a basket of six major currencies rose as high as 93.851, but held below the seven-week high of 93.92 reached on Tuesday as traders waited for Friday’s payrolls. The single currency was last down 0.30 percent against the greenback at $1.1725. Against the Japanese yen, the dollar fell 0.11 percent to 112.63 yen, while sterling declined 0.76 percent to trade at $1.3141.

In Commodities Markets  oil prices rose more than 2 percent on Thursday as signs Saudi Arabia and Russia would limit production through next year outweighed record U.S. exports and the return of production at a major Libyan oilfield. Brent was up $1.19 cents at $56.99 a barrel. U.S. crude rose 86 cents to $50.84. U.S. crude oil exports jumped to 1.98 million bpd last week, surpassing the 1.5 million bpd record set the previous week, the Energy Information Administration said.  Spot gold was down 0.1 percent at $1,273.66 an ounce. Silver rose 0.7 percent to $16.70 an ounce. Palladium added 1 percent to $931.10 after moving last week to a premium over sister metal platinum, which fell 0.2 percent to $910.95.

In US Equity Markets  the three main indexes climbed to fresh record-highs for the fourth day in a row on Thursday, fueled by gains in technology stocks, including Microsoft and Amazon.com. The Dow was up 0.4 percent, at 22,751.31, the S&P 500  was up 0.49 percent, at 2,550.38. The Nasdaq Composite index was up 0.62 percent, at 6,574.88. Shares of Netflix were up 4 percent after the company raised the monthly subscription fees for two of its three main U.S. plans by $1 and $2, respectively. Amazon was up 1.2 percent after the world’s largest online retailer said that it was testing its own delivery service, potentially encroaching on the territory of package delivery companies such as United Parcel Services and FedEx Corp.

In Bond Markets U.S. Treasury debt yields were slightly higher on Thursday in choppy trading, as investors continued to balance their positions ahead of Friday’s U.S. non-farm payrolls report for September. In mid-morning trading, the benchmark 10-year U.S. Treasury note yield was at 2.339 percent, up from 2.332 percent late on Wednesday, while the 30-year yield was at 2.881 percent, up from 2.877 percent. U.S. two-year note yields were up at 1.487 percent, from 1.479 percent on Wednesday.