The Paris Stock Exchange is preparing to gain a little more ground at the opening this Wednesday, i.e. a sixth session in a row in the green, in a month of August which for the moment defies the statistic according to which it is traditionally unfavorable to equity markets.
Halfway through, the Cac 40 gained 2.2%, an increase of more than 10% since the beginning of July. Traditionally, August is, after September, the worst month of the year with an average score of -1.16% (-1.38% for September). 20 times over the 33 years since the creation of the Cac 40, the market ended this month of August in the red.
While investors continue to be bearish, as Germany’s ZEW analyst sentiment index showed again yesterday, they are no longer “apocalyptically” bearish, Bank of America’s monthly survey of managers reveals. of global funds, in the hope that inflation will continue to decline over the next few months, which will cause the Fed to be less aggressive in its next monetary policy sessions. These fund managers have thus, in the space of a month, reduced their “underweighting” in equities from 44% to 26%. However, 58% of them anticipate a global economic recession in the next 12 months, compared to 47% last month. This is the level and the highest since May 2020.
Minutes more “offensive” than expected?
It is in this context that will be analysed, this evening at 8 p.m., the minutes of the last meeting of the Fed, which resulted in a further increase of 75 basis points in key rates. For the moment, the CME tool based on futures contracts on Fed-funds anticipates, at 57.5%, a tightening of 0.5 basis point in rates in September (42.5% for an increase of 0.75 point).
An important meeting, in the short term, but the FOMC’s next decision will depend above all on the next inflation figures for August and on the comments that will emerge from the Jackson Hole symposium at the end of the month. annual report of the world’s major central bankers.
Be careful though, for Ipek Ozkardeskaya, from Swissquote, “ the minutes will certainly seem more ‘offensives’ than expected as Fed rate expectations have likely softened too much after last week’s US consumer price report surprised with inflation 8.5% weaker than expected . This level of 8.5% is still very high; that’s more than four times the Fed’s 2% policy target. »
Failure in breast cancer at Sanofi
Before this meeting, scheduled after the close of Paris, therefore, we will follow the evolution of retail sales in the United States for the month of July. It will be at 2:30 p.m.
On the corporate side, Sanofi announced the discontinuation of the development of amcenestrant, an adjuvant treatment in breast cancer, the trials in progress having not reached the objectives set according to a preliminary analysis of the data.
Technip Energies was selected for a floating offshore wind project in South Korea.