The financial announcements on June 29 began with some mixed data from Japan. The country saw its unemployment rate increase surprisingly to 3% in May, which disappointed investors, but retail sales for the same month were better than expected.
In Europe, France published its official unemployment rate for the first quarter of 2021, which met the forecast of 8.1% exactly. France also pleased investors with a better than anticipated consumer confidence survey for June.
Within the broader eurozone, consumer confidence was exactly as expected at -3.3 in June, while economic and industrial sentiment improved more than anticipated.
Later today we expect two preliminary inflation rate reports from Germany for June and a speech by European Central Bank President Lagarde.
In the United States, there will also be a Federal Reserve speech and the consumer confidence report for June.
Today US stock indices will open slightly higher but likely trade with a mixed bias due to the upcoming NFP data at the end of the week. Out of all of them, the Nasdaq 100, with its high concentration of tech companies, is doing the best.
A company to keep an eye on right now is Facebook, which became the fifth US company to surpass a valuation of $1 trillion this week. Facebook gained a lot after a US court ruled in favor of it in a major antitrust case which could have demanded of Facebook to sell Instagram and WhatsApp.
Though right now Facebook is reaping the benefits of the decision, it is important to note that the case has not been dismissed and the FTC will likely file it again after amending the text that the court found problems with.
