Well, it certainly wasn’t an electric start to the quarter what with Trump limbering up for his big (‘very big, the biggest ever’) sweeping announcements tomorrow evening and investors still licking some wounds from the end of Q1 I think everyone will be quite satisfied with the 1% gain by broader Europe today. It wasn’t anything special but importantly it stopped what had been quite a consistent move lower the past week or so positives to be taken despite the two-day move still looking fairly…

That wasn’t exactly the ‘If Carlsberg did’ ends to the quarter that it might have looked like being for European equities just a few weeks ago as the Stoxx 600 had one of its worst days of the year ending it down 1.5% and now down 7 of the last 8 sessions. March actually included 4x more than -1% down days for the Stoxx 600 and the last time that happened was October 2023! The good news is it’s still been a good quarter of both performance and maybe more importantly outperformance. This was a b…

Having spent the best part of 8 hours in a car yesterday across M25, M1, M6, M54, M42 and M40 as I got myself to Oswestry for a 20minute knee appointment and back, I couldn’t help thinking there was an argument for it being a tad more exciting/livelier than today. It feels with Tarriff day/Liberation day or whatever you want to call April 2nd fixed in investors’ minds that the few days left of Q1 are all but written off, apart from the odd wobble like today. Volumes continue to fall off a cliff…

I hate writing off days before they begin but with the pop in volumes on quarterly options expiry Friday and a relatively quiet weekend news-slate it did feel as if it was going to be fairly subdued start to the week….and that was indeed the case. The Stoxx 600 ending the day broadly flat and it had a strange feeling like it was always going to do just that. Moves today might have some people concerned that the great rotation into Europe was over before it has even really got going with the U.S…

There was quite a significant part of me that thought yesterday’s Snapshot might have been my last. Loading up on what I thought was a dead cert, alas did not win the £130m odd Euromillions but not all is lost – it rolled over to Friday so tomorrow’s Snapshot may well be it – here’s hoping. There is always another day and that is the feeling of this week as we trudge our way through it and the Stoxx 600 did manage a 19bp gain and its fourth up day in a row. Volatility isn’t dropping in harmony…

My daughter is nearly 3 and has discovered that some things we do are now ‘boring her.’ I’m sure it’s a very common thing but I did think I had a few more years until that occurred. It ranges from things she’s watching on the TV, bedtime stories she’s heard, dinners we’ve cooked or maybe reading my Snapshots right now might be up there too! That’s because it was another day where we did not learn a huge amount: It’s certainly a positive that we’re at least back ascending in Europe but still the…

Another day and another attempt to stop the recent rot cane and went. Sentiment is poor though and early steadiness was replaced with a familiar feeling from the last few sessions of taking on water. Slightly better JOLTS job openings were enough to see a small lift but Trump almost immediately then started some Tariff noise; 50% on Canada Steel and Aluminium to go into effect….TOMORRROW! That was amongst a flurry of other headlines and there is unsteady feeling about when we in Europe might…

It’s one of the biggest betting weeks of the year for the UK as Cheltenham kicks of tomorrow. Whilst I’ll stay clear of some of the 4-legged chances this week here are some of my odds for the week in markets: A Ukraine/Russia ceasefire (10-1); Trump to table Tariffs on Europe (5-1), More stimulus from China to end their Two-Sessions meeting (6-4). U.S. Headline inflation to come in hotter than expected (Evens)….a volatile week ahead….well that one has already paid out as a winner! The going t…

If you’d told me either on Monday or Tuesday that by Wednesday’s close of play we’d be virtually flat on the week for the Stoxx 600 I’d have laughed for different reasons but 3 days into the week that’s where we are….As if it was at Friday’s close and the prevailing 3 days hadn’t happened. Something poetic about all this flipping going on around pancake day (none of mine hit the floor this year) but one thing for certain these are NOT easy markets. Economic growth on investors’ minds today as q…

It is now officially the time of year where you wear a jacket into the office, then its too warm to wear it back home and you end up with all your warm clothes in the office. I don’t know if there is a word for it (there really should be) but I’m definitely running out of room on the back of my chair. Few people might have been hiding behind chairs on a day like today which was the worst of the year in Europe across a wide variety of indices and the Stoxx 600 ended it down -2.1%. It maybe shoul…