Live updates: Eurozone budget deficit widens in wake of energy subsidies

Are you enjoying the beginning of the Lunar New Year? It is meant to represent the year of the rabbit Hope, peace and prosperity. And we all need more of those things in 2023. For now, this week is likely to focus on the more difficult matters of the present, not the least of which is China’s ability to vaccinate its citizens during the holiday season.

Industrial rows with ambulance workers will continue in England and Wales due to another strike on Monday. In Portugal, cabin crew at the national airline TAP will go on strike on Wednesday amid a dispute over the airline’s salary offer and working conditions.

In Westminster Politics on Tuesday, Labor’s shadow foreign secretary David Lamy will take a more positive tone when he gets going his party’s policy priorities. It is likely that it will affect the UK’s relationship with the European Union.

By coincidence, Monday is the tenth anniversary of former Prime Minister David Cameron Speech on Europe in which he pledged to renegotiate the UK’s relationship with the European Union and to introduce a referendum on membership. Maybe Lamy will point this out.

In the UK too, but not as far as the British government is concerned, Nigeria is set to hold a high-stakes legal trial at the High Court in London on Monday. The case involves a long term attempt to set aside an $11 billion arbitration award that left the Nigerian government owing more than a quarter of its foreign reserves to a shadowy oil and gas company.

The main election news in the next seven days will be the Czech presidential run-off, which ends on Saturday. Former NATO commander Peter Pavel is frontrunner. Also, Donald Trump is back. The former US president is expected to make his first public appearance of the 2024 campaign on Saturday, when he will name his leadership team in South Carolina.

Economic data

The fourth week of the month should be renamed Poll Week. Over the next seven days, we have a comparison of the G7 countries with updates to the PMI and Confederation of British Industry Industrial Trends Survey on Tuesday, followed by the German Ifo Business Climate report on Wednesday, as well as other measures of consumer confidence.

On Thursday, the United States released its first estimate of GDP movement in the fourth quarter of last year. Spain will follow suit on Friday. Inflation updates from the UK, Australia, Spain, Sweden and Singapore are due on Wednesday. Japan is also to report its consumer price cost of living index.

In central bank news, European Central Bank (ECB) Governing Council member Fabio Panetta is set to appear before the European Parliament’s Economic and Monetary Affairs Committee on Monday. Across the Atlantic, the Federal Reserve is entering a bore period ahead of the next Federal Open Market Committee meeting, which begins on January 31, and the Bank of Canada’s Monetary Policy Committee is expected to raise its rate another 25 basis points to 4.50 percent with the possibility of signaling a pause in increases. other.

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Technical gains are a major topic this week; Investors remain concerned about the outlook for the sector after a series of significant job cuts announcements by most of the major companies. The approach you took Microsoftwhich reports second-quarter numbers on Tuesday, It could be a model Other Big Tech players would follow suit, according to our West Coast Editor Richard Waters. Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella managed to strike a note of cautious optimism during it Announcing 10,000 layoffs Last week to reduce the cost base.

It will be another week for Elon Musk watchers (just like every other week) with Tesla Reporting fourth quarter numbers on Wednesday. The company was Piece prices of its electric cars to boost demand in the United States and Europe. We assume Musk will follow the FT’s coverage of the latest numbers in the claims made before Billionaire lawyer last week in court.

The war in Ukraine has boosted the fortunes of the world’s largest defense contractors, with governments promising more spending on weapons and other military equipment. Investors will be looking for comments from Lockheed Martin (Report on Tuesday) f Northrop Grumman (on Thursday) to see if these promises will generate future revenue.