Due to the holidays, the new trading week is likely to be relatively quiet, especially as some investors have already gone on their Christmas vacation or closed their books. The so-called "window dressing", when fund managers try to decorate their portfolios with particularly well-performing stocks shortly before the end of the year, could provide some impetus.
Window dressing usually leads to institutional investors in particular attempting to influence the performance of their portfolios on balance sheet dates, such as shortly before the end of the year, and thus "balance sheet cosmetics". This can achieve a change in liquidity status, for example.
Fed meeting likely to continue to have an impact - uncertainty over monetary policy interest rate course remains
Investors are unlikely to be tempted to make major investments in the final stages of 2024. In addition, the Fed's most recent meeting last Wednesday showed that monetary policy uncertainty for the coming year is likely to be greater than previously thought. Even though the US monetary authority tightened the interest rate screws as expected, the subdued interest rate outlook caused new worry lines.
It is possible that the Fed could pause interest rates at the first meeting of the new year at the end of January. The CME Group's "Fed Watch Tool" currently calculates a 91.4% chance of this scenario occurring.
Only for the March meeting (March 19) are the chances of a rate cut of 25 basis points better again (48.3 percent).
Consumer confidence and new orders for durable goods could provide impetus shortly before Christmas
From an economic calendar perspective, the Conference Board's consumer confidence report on Monday (16:00) could provide signals for trading.
Please note that there are only shortened trading hours on Tuesday (15:30 - 19:00 CET).
On Christmas Eve, new orders for durable goods are published in the afternoon (14:30), which are generally associated with higher spending and can therefore provide important indications of activity in the US economy.
The stock exchange doors will be closed on Christmas Day (25.12.) due to the holiday. Regular trading will take place on Wall Street on Thursday and therefore on Boxing Day.
The weekly initial claims for US unemployment benefits are usually published on Thursday (14:30).
