• US indices defied global trend and managed to close higher yesterday. S&P 500 gained 0.57%, Dow Jones moved 0.70% higher and Nasdaq gained 1.29%. Russell 2000 added 0.70%.
• Improved moods were presented during the Asian session as well. Nikkei gained 0.5%, Kospi moved 0.4% higher and indices from China traded up to 1.5% higher. S&P/ASX 200 dropped almost 2% (Australian stock exchange was closed yesterday)
• DAX futures point to a higher opening of the European cash session today.
• Russian Foreign Minister Lavrov said that NATO is fighting proxy war with Russia by arming Ukraine. In spite of recent reports saying that Russia no longer wish to negotiate with Ukraine, Lavrov also said his country will continue to engage in peace talks.
• United Kingdom will remove tariffs on all goods imported from Ukraine.
• Mass testing in Beijing has been extended to a whole city. Previously testing was carried out only in communities that reported local outbreaks.
• IMF sees a risk of bigger slowdown in China and stagflation in the rest of Asia.
• Morgan Stanley lowered China GDP growth forecast for 2022 from 4.6 to 4.2% due to Covid disruptions.

• Japanese unemployment rate dropped from 2.7 to 2.6% in March (exp. 2.7%).
• Twitter accepted Elon Musk’s offer and will be bought for $54.20 per share. Twitter will be taken private once the deal is completed. Stock jumped 5.6% yesterday.
• Scale of moves on the cryptocurrency market is small. Bitcoin gained 1% while Ethereum trades flat.
• Energy commodities trade higher with both Brent and WTI gaining around 1% today.
• Precious metals benefit from USD weakness. Gold trades 0.5% higher while palladium rallies over 3%.
• AUD and CAD are the best performing major currencies while CHF and USD lag the most.

Nasdaq-100 (US100) managed to snap a losing streak after finding a support in the 13,150 pts zone yesterday. However, things may get more volatile for the index as 5 US mega tech companies (Microsoft, Apple, Amazon, Alphabet and Meta) will report Q1 2022 results between today and Thursday. Source: xStation5