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NASDAQ higher on Fed Day, private payrolls rise
In the United States, the NASDAQ climbed to a new high as markets began to gear up for Wednesday’s FOMC meeting.
The tech centric index rose for a third consecutive session, as investors prepared to receive a timeline from the Fed detailing when they will begin tapering their QE program.
In addition to this, markets were boosted by the news that private payrolls in the U.S. surpassed expectations, ahead of Friday’s NFP report.
Data from the ADP employment survey showed that private employment increased by 571,000 jobs in October, better than the 400,000 expected rise.
The biggest contributor to the increase was the leisure and hospitality sector, which added 185,000 jobs.
As of writing the NASDAQ was trading marginally higher.
DAX 30 nears record, as ECB quash rate hike expectations
The DAX 30 edged closer to a record high during Wednesday’s session, as ECB President Christine Lagarde doubled down on the bank’s stance on interest rates.
Speaking at an event in Lisbon, Lagarde stated that, “In our forward guidance on interest rates, we have clearly articulated the three conditions that need to be satisfied before rates will start to rise”.
She went on to add that, “Despite the current inflation surge, the outlook for inflation over the medium term remains subdued, and thus these three conditions are very unlikely to be satisfied next year”.
| 💡 German media, especially critical of the ECB Invoking Napoleon’s self-coronation, commentator and former Handelsblatt editor-in-chief Gabor Steingart accused the central bank Wednesday of attempting a power grab, infatuated with its role as the savior of the currency union. |
Despite inflation rates in the eurozone at their highest level in over 13-years, the bank still remains hesitant to increase rates, which haven’t been hiked in over a decade.
EURUSD was mainly unchanged on the comments, trading at 1.1579, after falling to an intraday low of 1.1562 earlier in the session.
Ethereum prices rally to new highs
The record highs were not only in index markets, with prices of the world’s second largest cryptocurrency also reaching a new all-time high on Wednesday.
ETHUSD rallied to an intraday high of 4,642.07, its highest on record, cementing a market cap slightly under $550 billion in the process.
The gain comes as Bitcoin, Shiba Inu and Dogecoin all fell lower in the session, and with Ether higher after bullish comments from analysts at Goldman Sachs.
| 💡 Meme stocks, reddit, Ethereum and the digital space GameStop stock has gained 22% in three days of trading this week as Redditors cheer rumors that the company could be partnering with an ethereum-based crypto for its NFT project. Thousands of Redditors upvoted posts from late last week that claimed loopring, which creates a layer 2 ethereum-based token, is behind GameStop’s upcoming nonfungible token efforts. |
Managing Director of Global Markets at Goldman, Bernhard Rzymelka, stated that prices could reach as high as $8,000 if current technical patterns continue.
He added that, “The market has started to press against the all-time high with a narrowing wedge: Either a sign of exhaustion and peaking … or a starting point of an accelerating rally upon a break higher”.
“In trading, the impossible happens about twice a year.”
– Henri M Simoes
