For the most part overnight trading has been typical for a US holiday. Stocks have been relatively steady with the Nikkei up 0.9%, the Dax up 0.1% and the FTSE down 0.3%. WTI and Brent crude oil are up 0.2%.
Currency markets have remained active overnight as the reaction of Wednesday's big data driven breakout in USD continued to work its way through world markets. The greenback extended its gains overnight but into the morning the bulls have relented a bit. This has enabled gold to stabilise at a lower level while CAD, JPY, EUR and GBP have been able to recover slightly. Japanese flash manufacturing was slightly below expectations, German GDP was in-line and the German IFO business survey was mixed.
The big star overnight has been copper which has resumed its uptrend in a big way with its recent correction over. This action indicates traders are expecting an upturn in demand for materials moving forward. This could keep a tailwind behind mining stocks.
It's common on days when the US is closed and Canada is open for the Canadian market to trade slightly higher on light volumes. Today, the focus may remain on resource sectors between the copper rally and gold plunge of the last 24 hours plus speculation in the oil sector ahead of next week's big OPEC meeting.