Positive US jobs reports boosts EU markets, oil, gold, BTC over $24,000

EU markets higher Monday morning 

European markets opened higher on Monday morning, highly influenced by a strong US jobs report.  

The DAX was 0.28% higher in early trade on Monday, the FTSE 100 was up by just 0.30% and France’s CAC 40 rose by 0.53%.  

In addition, EU markets have benefitted over the last couple of weeks from the release of largely positive corporate earnings.  

In addition, investor attention will be focusing on Wednesday’s US CPI data, especially after Friday’s stronger-than-anticipated US jobs report which diluted hopes that the Federal Reserve may relent in its aggressive campaign to tame inflation. 

US payrolls data better than expected  

US nonfarm payrolls increased by 528,000 in July and unemployment rate was 3.5%, easily topping the analyst estimates of 3.6%.  

Wage growth also surged, as average hourly earnings jumped 0.5% for the month and 5.2% from a year ago, also surpassing analyst estimates.  

Oil higher following positive payrolls data 

Oil prices bounced in early trade on Monday morning trying to regain some of their multi-month losses also influenced by the positive US nonfarm payrolls and Chinese export data.  

Brent Crude futures were 0.9% higher and valued at $95.73 a barrel while West Texas Intermediate (WTI) futures surged by 0.8%  and were valued at $89.76 a barrel.  

Brent futures last week reached their lowest levels since February, tumbling by 13.7% and posting their largest weekly drop since April 2020, while WTI lost 9.7%, as concerns about a recession hitting oil demand weighed on prices. 

On Sunday, China reported a faster-than-expected exports data according to which the country imported 8.79 million barrels per day of crude in July, up from a four-year low in June, but still 9.5% less than a year earlier. 

Gold futures higher  

Gold futures were also higher on Monday morning, growing by 0.2% and costing $1,794.55/oz.  

Silver futures also followed the bullish trend, up by 0.93%, platinum futures were 0.45% higher and palladium futures grew by 2.11%.  

Veolia shares rise as company agrees to sell Suez’s UK asset  

Veolina Environment’s shares rose by 2% on Monday morning after the company announced that it had agreed to sell Suez’s UK waste management business for 2.4 billion euros to Australia’s Macquarie Group.  

“We are very satisfied with this transaction, which is being carried out under excellent conditions that once again demonstrate the attractiveness of the environmental services business and the relevance of our proposal for remedies to the CMA,” the company’s CEO, Estelle Brachlianoff, said in a statement. 

This deal still needs to be approved by the UK Competition and Markets Authority.  

Brachlianoff added that Veolina will continue to remain a key player in the UK waste management market with its revenues amounting to around 2 billion euros.  

UPS to buy Italy’s Bomi Group  

United Parcel Service Inc (UPS) said on Monday that it would buy Italy-based healthcare-logistics firm Bomi Group to boost its presence in the temperature-critical medicine deliveries sector.  

The transaction’s financial details were not disclosed by UPS, but according to the Wall Street Journal, the transaction may amount to several hundred million dollars.  

The deal is expected to help UPS add more than 350 temperature-controlled facilities, or warehouses used to store temperature-sensitive pharmaceutical products across 14 countries. 

Bitcoin surpasses $24,000  

Bitcoin (BTC) continued its bullish trend on Monday morning finally managing to break the $24,000 barrier, surging by 0.52% in the past 24 hours.  

Ethereum (ETH) was 1.63% higher in the past 24 hours. BNB grew by 0.22%, Cardano (ADA) was up by 0.13% meanwhile Solana (SOL) fell by 0.20%.  

The popular Elon Musk-endorsed memetoken Dogecoin (DOGE) was 0.22% higher.