What you need to know on Monday, May 18th:
The dollar closed the week with a strong note, despite reporting on Friday that Retail Sales fell by 6.4% in April, the largest slump on record. The Michigan Consumer Sentiment Index beat expectations, printing 73.7 in May.
The EUR/USD pair closed the week as it started it, a handful of pips above the 1.0800 mark. News over the weekend showed that German EU parliamentarian Weber said that he favours declaring a twelve-month ban on Chinese investors who want to buy European firms.
The pound was the worst performer, undermined by Brexit woes. The UK and the EU, both reported a deadlock in talks, amid disagreement on the EU’s demand for a level playing field. Andrew Haldane, Bank of England’s Governor, said that “there are other options beyond that, or alongside that, that we’re looking at as well,” when referring to negative interest rates. He also discussed the use of QE, although he later clarified that he was not implied policymakers are poised on any of those options.
Commodity-linked currencies fell on Friday and closed the week with a soft tone against the greenback, despite oil and gold posted substantial weekly gains. WTI settled just below $30.00 a barrel, while spot gold hit a multi-year high of 1,751.75 a troy ounce.
US indexes settled on Friday near its daily highs but remained in the red weekly basis. The market’s sentiment continued to fluctuate between fears of economic downturns and hopes on reopenings. Treasury yields remained depressed throughout the week.
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