09:05am    It’s Non Farm Payrolls Day in the U.S. so as usual the markets will be drifting sideways this morning and then reasonably volatile this afternoon so I will not be trading at all today but will be back here on Tuesday after a long weekend break.

Market Update:

Markets in the U.S. closed strongly on Thursday with the S&P-500 and Nasdaq indices hitting intraday highs on hopes of a favourable jobs report later today. The ADP Non Farm Report which is released 24 hrs ahead of the NFP numbers indicated a rise of 253,000 positions although today’s numbers are not expected to be as optimistic but a good number (over 100,000) should excite equity markets into some bullish moves and strengthen the case for a June rate rise from the Fed.

Asian markets followed on from Thursday’s bullishness despite President Trump’s decision to pull the U.S. out of the Paris Climate Accord.  Most indices had a positive session and closed ahead and only the Shanghai Composite had a slight blip at the end to close 0.28% down.  The bullish sentiment has continued as the European trading session gets underway with all bourses showing good gains for this last trading day of the week.

Oil had another negative day’s trading yesterday and WTI Crude closed down 59 cents and $48.01 at the close and is further in the red this morning at $47.49 and closing in on the $47.00 minor support area as continuing oversupply dogs the market even though this week’s Crude Oil Inventories showed a small decline. Traders can see increased shale oil production coming after Trump’s decision to pull out of the Paris agreement.