The head of the Federal Reserve (Fed) Jerome Powell is expected to deliver a speech on Friday at Jackson Hole annual symposium. Investors are completely focused on Powell’s testimony mostly ignoring incoming macroeconomic data. However, some economic data was a matter of concern.
PMI indexes in the United States and in some other countries came out shocking as Services PMI in the U.S. dropped in august to 44.1 points, while Production PMI in the United Kingdom fell to 46.0 points. The3se are worst reading since 2020. PMI’s in other countries with a minor exclusion are pointing to a global economic slowdown.
Some positive tunes were brought by the Q2 2022 second GDP estimate in the U.S. and Germany. Estimates were upgraded to -0.6% from the previous -0.8% in America and to 0.1% from 0.0% in Germany. This could hardly comfort investors, but together with lower Initial Jobless Claims in the U.S. it leveled up the market before the weekend.
S&P broad market index lost around 2% this week. Major investment houses are warning its clients that a rise of monthly bond sales by the Fed to $95 billion in September would plunge the stock market by another 25-30%. Technical picture of the S&P 500 index demonstrates a downside patter of the index with primary target at 3900-4000 point. The U.S. stock market benchmark fell below the support at 4220 points close to the gap of the beginning of this week. It is quite possible this gap could be closed after Powell’s testimony. . During two previous week short positions for the 70% of targeted amount for S&P 500 index were opened at the average price at 4285-4290 points. The rest of the targeted volume would be used once new technical signals would emerge. The target area is located at 2100-2300 points that is expected to be reached by the end of 2022.
Oil market is short of time to active an upside scenario with targets at $135-145 per barrel of Brent crude benchmark. There are no triggers for such a scenario to become real at the moment. Moreover, if Brent prices would close this week below $106 per barrel an aggressive downside formation could pressure prices to $75-85 per barrel, and even to the extreme targets at $50-60 per barrel by the end of November. So, the Powell’s speech at Jackson Hole could be the last chance for bulls to avoid this scenario.
Gold prices slightly rebounded from the support at $1700-1730 per troy ounce to $1760. However, it does not change much as the decision to open short positions has to be made in the first half of September either from $1800-1820 per ounce, or after prices drop below the support at $1700-1730. Both scenarios have downside targets at $1350-1450 per ounce.
EURUSD met its primary target at 0.99500-1.00500, and has missed a chance for a rebound. The pair is likely to continue diving deep below after it tested 0.99500 support level several times this week. Next week the euro may fell to 0.98500 is Powell’s speech would be disappointing.
GBPUSD continues aggressive downside with the completed primary target at 1.18000-1.19000 with the remaining secondary targets at 1.15000-1.16000 that are becoming more as the Euro goes down. However, there are no good entry points to open any trade positions so far.