Apologies for missed or delayed reports

Good morning

US data releases will be one hour earlier at 12.30 or 14.00 london time due to the US clock changes that took place at the weekend. 

In addition, FX option expiries will be 14.00 london time, not the usual 15.00 london time.

This will be until Sunday 30th when we change our clocks in the UK.

Firstly, apologies to the many of you who did not receive your email reports towards the end of last week.  My antivirus software seemed to have developed a habit of not allowing me to do my own work, but it seems to have been resolved this morning so hopefully now it is business as usual. 

Fortunately, after a busy start to the week, GBPUSD settled down in the latter part of the week, happy to sit between 1.2920 and 1.2960 for most of the time.  Not quite the same for other majors, EURUSD moved from a high early in the week of 1.0945 to 1.0820, before making another move back above 1.0900.  As I type it is 1.0905, and with GBPUSD having made a bit of ground this morning, now up at 1.2970, GBPEUR is 1.1890.

Trumps tariffs and possible resulting trade wars have had a profound effect on the markets, including sending global equity prices lower, although Friday did see some improvement, I fear which may be short-lived and no doubt we’ll see continued volatility.

A lot of talk of possible peace in Ukraine, Trump suggests he’ll be talking to Putin tomorrow, the two will likely plan to carve up Ukraine, something Ukraine has never wanted but I am sorry to say now seems rather inevitable.  The key I guess will be whether Russia is then prevented from further invasions, be it on Ukraine or any other country.

In sport, England came close to winning the six nations after a decisive win over Wales, but France got the four tries needed against Scotland to give them the bonus point to provide them with a pne point lead in the table, indeed they’d have won it on points difference anyway I believe so Scotland really had to win for England to claim the title.  England will come away quite happy althgouh it is fair to say their final matches were certainly against the easier of the opposition. 

In football, many congratulations to Newcastle for their victory over Liverpool in the League cup yesterday.  Let’s not talk much about Spurs.  It isn’t looking good there right now and I cannot help but feel that unless Spurs manage to somehow raise the Europa League trophy, Ange’s job is likely to be over.  With Spurs not firing on all cylinders, indeed hardly firing on any cylinders at all, a Europa Cup win is a nice idea but not particularly realistic I fear.  Meanwhile, Forest continue their incredible season with a win over Ipswich, Forest third in the table with a five point advantage over fourth placed Chelsea. 

Elsewhere, the F1 season began with a pretty exciting race in Australia that saw seven different constructors take the top eight places, something that bodes well for the season ahead.  The Chinese grand prix is up next, starting this coming Friday.

Todays calendar isn’t long but US retail sales are always of interest, perhaps more so now as we look for signs of any slowdown in domestic demand.  We do have a bust week ahead, the highlights being the Fed and BoE rate announcements on Wednesday and Thursday respectively.  We also have EU, Canadian and Japan inflation, BoJ, SNB and PBoC rate meetings, NZ GDP, and UK and Aussie employment numbers.  Never a dull moment.

I’ll leave it there fort now given how late you’ll be receiving this, but I’m hopeful full service will be resumed tomorrow morning.

Have a great day…

-  12.30 US retail sales, NY empire state manufacturing

-  14.00 ECBs Lagarde speaks