Written on: May 1, 2023
Monday, May 1, 2023
The energy complex is trading in the red as of this writing on Monday morning amid continued recession fears, weakness in US stock market index futures and strength in the US dollar. Market traders are looking ahead to US manufacturing and construction spending data for further direction.
Reuters reports that JPMorgan Chase & Co has announced that it will buy most of First Republic Bank ($10.6 billion deal) after US regulators seized the bank over the weekend. This is the third major US lender, after Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank, to fail in two months. In more news, the Fed is meeting on May 2nd and is expected to increase interest rates by another 25 basis points.
The Shanghai and Hong Kong Stock Exchanges are closed today for a holiday. European stock markets are closed as well. The Nikkei in Japan rose 0.9% overnight. The Nikkei/S&P Global Manufacturing PMI for India rose from 56.4 in March to 57.2 last month, indicating expansion in the sector accelerated.
As of this writing, futures for US stock market indexes were trading just south of the unchanged mark. Also unsupportive, the US dollar index was up 0.1%.
Crude futures strengthened on Friday amid gains in global equities, despite strength in the US dollar. Brent crude rose $1.17 to $79.54 a barrel and WTI crude added $2.02 to close at $76.78 a barrel. Heating oil and gasoline futures also settled higher on their last trading day. Gasoline futures rose 4.52 cents to $2.5780 per gallon and heating oil 2.45 cents higher to settle at $2.3787 per gallon. Natural gas futures jumped 5.5 cents higher to settle at $2.410 per MMBTU.