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| This week's gainers and losers |
Top gainers: Palantir (+28%): the American data analytics group, specializing in defense and security, announced its first quarterly profit, while Wall Street was expecting a loss, and revenues up 18%, higher than expected for the period. Airbnb (+28%): the recovery in tourism is benefiting Airbnb. The group recorded its first full year of profitability in 2022. It signs an annual net profit at $1.9 billion, compared to an annual loss of $353 million in 2021. Draftking (+28%): The sports entertainment and digital games specialist reported very satisfactory results. Hubspot (+17%): The customer relationship management platform reported revenue up 30% to USD 1,730.97 million. Kinsale Capital (+15%): The insurance company is seeing its stock rise this week after posting a positive result in the fourth quarter. Top losers: Credo Technology (-45%): the small data infrastructure equipment provider reported very disappointing sales, after a significant drop in orders from its main customer. Indivior (-15%): the UK pharma said it has set aside $290 million for ongoing litigation in the US, a heavier-than-expected provision that pushes 2022 results into the red, despite revenues up 14%. Organon (-14%): the 2022 results of the laboratory specializing in women's health did not live up to expectations, both in terms of revenue and profit. Shopify (-7%): the e-commerce website solutions specialist sank on the back of disappointing quarterly revenues, coupled with rising costs. Monthly recurring revenues increased by only 7%, a sign of a potential slowdown in subscriber growth. |
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| Commodities |
Energy: Oil prices fell this week, partly due to the announcement of a 26 million barrel increase in U.S. strategic reserves. Some observers had expected the cancellation, or at least postponement, of these measures to curb rising energy prices for U.S. consumers. The other major news of the week came from OPEC, which revised its demand outlook for 2023 upward, displaying a degree of optimism that the cartel had not shown in months. OPEC still expects the Chinese revival to boost global oil demand this year and raised its forecast by 100,000 barrels per day. In terms of prices, North Sea Brent is trading around USD 83.3, while US WTI is trading at USD 77 per barrel. On the natural gas side, there is still nothing to report, with prices continuing to decline at 49 EUR/MWh for the Dutch TTF. Metals: Industrial metals continued their volatile trend this week, penalized by renewed risk aversion and a stronger US dollar. A ton of copper is trading around USD 9,000 on the London Metal Exchange. However, supply risks are still present in some sectors, as Norsk Hydro's management reminded us, as they face major obstacles due to the volatility of energy prices. Gold also lost some ground, trading at USD 1824 and weighed down by rising bond yields. Agricultural commodities: Like energy and metal prices, grain prices also fell this week. In Chicago, bushels of wheat and corn are trading around 760 and 670 cents, respectively. |
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| Macroeconomics |
Atmosphere: Never happy. The US economy is too strong. Too much consumption, too much confidence, and retail and producer prices that are worrying again. Investors are caught up in the fear that the Fed will raise rates higher than expected, which caused risk assets to bend as of Thursday. The mood has changed a bit compared to January: all the statistics are no longer going in the direction of easing prices, which raises some questions after the big rebound recorded by the equity markets. Currencies: The increase in expectations of rate peaks in the United States has naturally benefited the greenback. As a result, the dollar rose to EUR 0.9349. Forex traders believe that the 10Y US yield will have to fall below 3.7% for the single currency to regain momentum. The U.S. currency also continued its gains against the yen, at JPY 134.75, ahead of next week's hearing by Japanese lawmakers of the future governor of the Bank of Japan, Kazuo Ueda. The Dollar Index, which measures the strength of the greenback against a basket of six currencies (euro, yen, pound sterling, Canadian dollar, Swedish krona, Swiss franc), flirted Friday with its highs of the beginning of the year, at 104.50 points. Rates: Economic indicators released this week fueled the rise in bonds. Between a slightly disappointing US CPI (it did not fall as expected) and leading indicators that continue to deteriorate, the mood is rather gloomy. The "smart money", the name commonly given to interest rate investors, favors a continuation of the Fed's restrictive policy and has nicely pushed the yield on the US 10-year to our target zone at 3.90/3.95%. At the same time, junk bonds (JNK) hit a nice resistance zone around $94 and resumed their initial downtrend with potential new lows in prospect. It should be remembered here that prices move in inverse proportion to yields. In Europe, the trend is identical with expectations of a rate hike by the ECB, which has now reached 3.75%. Currently, the German 10-year yield is trading at around 2.55%, which shows the upside potential if the expectations are correct! Cryptocurrencies: Bitcoin is recovering more than 9% this week and is back flirting with $24,000 as of this writing. The digital currency even hit $25,000 on Thursday night. With the macroeconomic environment worsening, or at least less favorable than expected by market participants, crypto-currencies have stalled at the end of the week. Still, crypto-investors have something to smile about for now, with bitcoin recovering almost 50% since the beginning of the year. The inflation and monetary policy slider will be the two indicators that will continue to lead the way in the coming weeks in this market. Calendar: February's leading PMI indicators will be available on Tuesday, along with the ZEW, the German financial confidence index. On Wednesday, the market is waiting for the minutes of the last Fed meeting. On Thursday, it will be the turn of a new estimate of US GDP for the fourth quarter. The week will close on Friday with the January PCE inflation in the United States, at a time when, as we can see, the direction of prices is once again being questioned. |
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| Things to read this week | ||
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*The weekly movements of indexes and stocks displayed on the dashboard are related to the period ranging from the open on Monday to the sending time of this newsletter on Friday. The weekly movements of commodities, precious metals and currencies displayed on the dashboard are related to a 7-day rolling period from Friday to Friday, until the sending time of this newsletter. These assets continue to quote on weekends. |
