Europe aims to start at the waterline. Asia in the red after Taiwan earthquake – Markets in a minute

Europe aims to start at the waterline. Asia in the red after earthquake in Taiwan

To the European stock exchanges point to a practically unchanged start to tradingwith futures on the Euro Stoxx 50 at the waterline.

The lukewarm start of the session takes place on the day that new economic data in the Euro Zone will be released. Eurostat releases today the flash estimate for inflation in March and unemployment figures.

This data will be analyzed carefully by investors, since the evolution of price increases and the situation in the labor market are two of the points that the European Central Bank (ECB) takes into account when deciding the course of monetary policy.

In Asia, the session ended in the red, following the trend on Wall Street yesterday. The market is evaluating whether robust economic data combined with higher commodity prices will lead the Federal Reserve (Fed) to keep interest rates at current levels for longer.

Furthermore, the negotiation was also penalized by an earthquake in Taipei, Taiwan. The region was hit by an earthquake measuring 7.4 on the Richter scale, the strongest in that area in 25 years. Impacts were felt in China and Japan, which has already issued a tsunami warning.

In China, the Hang Seng, in Hong Kong, fell 1.15%, while the Shanghai Composite fell 0.2%. In Japan, the Nikkei lost 0.97% and the Topix slid 0.29%, while in South Korea, the Kospi lost 1.56%.

One of the focuses of investors’ attention today will be the speech by Fed President Jerome Powell in Stanford, California. The expectation is that his words will allow us to obtain clues about the central bank’s rationale regarding the evolution of interest rates.