Morning wrap (28.04.2021)

• US indices finished yesterday's trading mixed. S&P 500 dropped 0.02%, Dow Jones added 0.01%, Russell finished 0.14% higher and Nasdaq dropped 0.34%

• Stocks in Asia are trading mixed as well. S&P/ASX 200 and Nikkei gain 0.4% while Kospi trades 0.9% lower

• DAX futures point to a higher opening of the European session

• According to media reports, Biden dropped a plan to lower threshold for estate tax

• US officials say that timing of Biden-Putin meeting is being discussed with Russia

• Goldman Sachs expects commodities to rally 13.5% over the next six month, with oil price reaching $80 per barrel

• Australian CPI inflation reached 0.6% QoQ in Q1 2021 (exp. +0.9% QoQ)

• Japanese retail sales increased 5.2% YoY in March (exp. 4.7% YoY)

• API report showed a 0.43 million barrel build in US oil inventories (exp. +0.3 mb)

• Alphabet (GOOGL.US) reported Q1 revenue at $45.602 billion (exp. $42.61 billion) and adjusted earnings per share of $20.779 (exp. $17.709). Revenue excluding traffic acquisition costs increased 35% YoY

• Microsoft (MSFT.US) reported calendar Q1 revenue at $41.706 billion (exp $41.05 billion) and adjusted earnings per share at $1.95 (exp $1.78). Revenue in the Intelligent Cloud segment increased 23.1% YoY to $15.118 billion

• Precious metals, oil and industrial metals trade lower

• NZD and USD are the best performing major currencies while AUD and CHF lag the most

AUDUSD is one of the worst performing major currencies pairs today. AUD took a hit following a release of the worse than expected CPI report and the pair dropped below 200-hour moving average (purple line). However, declines were halted near the 61.8% retracement of a recent upward move and the pair started to recover. Source: xStation5