Markets
Miners and Auto stocks focus early in the European session following a solid upside move in commodities in the US and Asia and a positive pre-release from BMW (OTC:BMWYY).
Tobacco names are likely to be active on a report the US could mandate a reduction in nicotine levels.
The street remains slightly better for sale in a tranquil frame of mind while again skewed defensively.
Forex
The technical break above EUR/USD 1.2000 sparked the fireworks trigging some new buying interest by the looks of things. But the slide in US rates seems to be running out of steam, with the Treasuries/Bund spread unchanged over the last few days around at 1.85. I don't think the street has much interest in chasing it up here, given that the pair traded on a low 1.17 handle three weeks ago when US rates ripped.
Oil
Oil has had a decent bounce as broader equity markets traded weaker and appeared to be entirely linked to the EUR/USD with a ~1% drop in the USD index.
Today marks the 1st anniversary of the WTI contract closing at -$37.63/bbl and a subsequent one-year price rally of >$100/bbl as the market worried about storage filling.
Now it appears that OPEC+, which was in the middle of a dumb market share war one year ago, is so at ease with the prospect of recovering demand and the stability of its quota agreement that the next monthly meeting at the end of April is likely to be downgraded to a JMMC, but without the complete ministerial get-together. So steady as she goes with nary a sign of more supply coming back that has already been taken into consideration.
Gold
Gold is still lagging considerably on the broader USD sell-off that is taking place against G10 and the general reflation story. Still, the fact that gold has somewhat managed to hold despite a 15% drop in Bitcoin and cryptocurrency assets over the weekend is also reassuring, as it could be a sign that any reallocation that could have been taking place might be taking a hiatus.