Oil and world are in danger, a pound in anticipation

Traditionally, we start the review with news about the coronavirus epidemic. Once again, we note that the matter is even on its scale - thousands of times more people die from ordinary flu, and hundreds of thousands of times more get sick each year. The point is the problems that this epidemic has on the global economy.

A number of key industrial centers in China have been completely or partially idle for the third week. Each such day is further destruction of the global supply chain, and if there are still enough stocks in warehouses, then every day the risk of a shortage of materials to continue the activities of companies becomes higher, as well as the scale of losses.

One of the main victims this week maybe oil. We wrote that last week OPEC+ was able to tentatively agree to reduce oil production by another 600K b/d. But yesterday information appeared that Russia could refuse this. And here, even in Libya, the warring parties are close to signing a peace treaty, which is fraught with the return of several hundred thousand barrels per day to the oil market. And all this is happening against the backdrop of a sharp drop in oil demand from China. Not surprisingly, some experts predict an oil drop of at least 10% in the foreseeable future. In general, oil sales this week remain our basic trading idea.

Returning to the current figures on the scale of the epidemic, we note that the number of deaths is approaching 1,000, and the number of cases is close to 50,000. Once again, we recall that these are official statistics. The main mass of experts converges in opinion, that the figures are underestimated by several times to several tens of times.

In connection with such a development of events, we cannot but recall our recommendation to sell the Russian ruble. The conditions for this are almost ideal, especially when you consider that the Central Bank of the Russian Federation lowered the rate again last week and plans to do this further in 2020.

Today, in terms of macroeconomic statistics, it will be interesting primarily for the British pound. Data on GDP and industrial production can trigger a surge in volatility in pound pairs. Given that in recent days, the pound was already under strong downward pressure, weak data will almost certainly trigger a new wave of sales. But at the same time, good numbers can give a start for strengthening the pound - points for its purchases are very attractive. In general, today you can try news trading, with pending orders or enter after the news, playing back a fundamental positive or negative.