This past week the world was focused on the US housing market data as well as on quarterly reports publications of global companies. The macro reports disappointed the crowd since they were worse than expected. Existing Home Sales dropped to 5.04M (Expected: 5.25M) while Durable Goods Order declined by 1.7% (Expected: +1.6%). New Home Sales were at 770K, as expectations, but lower than the previous month. What helped US indices was better than expected quarterly results of some of the big companies, including Apple and Microsoft. Till Thursday, the Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 1.5% to 13,666 whiles the more reliable S&P500 increased by 0.5% to 1,513. On Friday, the Dow opened at +0.62% whiles the S&P at +1.0%. The trend was followed by Asian indices where the Japanese Nikkei 225 added 0.72% to 16.464.

Polish investors were expecting much from last Sunday’s elections, which were won by the Civic Platform. Despite Friday’s close of the Dow at -2.6%, the WIG20 lost on Monday only 0.4%. Since then, the major Polish index kept gaining. Macroeconomic publications certainly helped the Polish equities market. Net inflation remained at 1.2% on a yearly basis with unemployment falling to 11.6%. Retail Sales were worse than expected at 14.2% (Expected: 16.5%) but still confirming that consumer spending stays strong. The Warsaw Stock Exchange’s WIG20 reached a weekly low at 3,750 but kept increasing since then. During the whole week it gained 3.0% reaching 3,910 at some point.   

The markets are certainly waiting for next week’s decision of the Federal Open Market Committee regarding interest rates. Analysts expect another interest rate cut by 25 basis points to 4.50%. That can push the Dow, the S&P500, and the WIG20 to new all-time highs.

Adam Narczewski