According to calculations by banks and brokerage houses, the Dax will start higher on Friday. On Thursday, it had ended trading with 15,989 points just in the plus. On Wall Street, driven by gains in high-tech stocks, the upward trend was more significant.

The euro maintained its previous day's gains on Friday. In the morning, the common currency cost 1.0781 US dollars, about the same as the previous evening. The European Central Bank had recently set the reference rate at 1.0737 (Wednesday: 1.0717) dollars.

The day before, the euro exchange rate had been boosted by weak US labor market data. Last week, the number of weekly initial jobless claims had risen much more than analysts had expected. The development also plays an important role for the US Federal Reserve. For some time now, it has been trying to get a grip on high inflation with interest rate hikes. The data could now suggest that the previous hikes are already having an effect. This would suggest that the Fed could indeed pause interest rates in the coming week, as expected by the market.

Chin publishes inflation data

Many investors are focusing on the future monetary policy of the US Federal Reserve. It will decide on interest rates on Wednesday. Most experts expect the monetary authorities to keep their feet still in June. Since the beginning of 2022, the Fed has already raised interest rates ten times in a row to counter the upward pressure on prices and cool down the hot labor market.

China is also likely to come into focus, where the statistics agency has published inflation data for May. According to the report, consumer prices rose by 0.2 percent and producer prices fell by 4.6 percent. The latest economic data had shown that China's economy is recovering only slowly after the lifting of strict corona restrictions in December due to the global economic slowdown and weakening domestic demand.

Oil prices continued to decline on Friday. However, the movements were kept within limits at the end of the week. A barrel (159 liters) of North Sea Brent crude for delivery in August cost $75.43. That was 53 cents less than on Thursday. The price of a barrel of American West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude for July delivery fell by 50 cents to $70.79.

According to traders, demand concerns are once again dominating the oil market. The optimism that still prevailed at the beginning of the week about Saudi Arabia's unilateral cut in production by one million barrels per day for July has now evaporated.

According to Citigroup, this measure is not enough to compensate for the current weak fundamentals in the oil market. As the World Bank recently stated, high interest rates and Russia's war of aggression in Ukraine continue to significantly slow down global economic growth. As a result, the demand for crude oil as a lubricant for the economy is also likely to fall.