The theme of the markets today is GDP. We have quite a few releases of GDP reports for Q2 scheduled both in Europe and in the US, which might throw the markets off.

There were inflation releases as well, such as the Spanish and Japanese CPI (consumer price index) reports which were mostly positive. However, these particular numbers are not big market movers at the moment.   

Earlier this morning the French and Spanish GDP reports were released. The French flash GDP for Q2 came in as expected at 0.5% but last quarter´s number was revised 0.2% higher. That´s quite a big upward revision to be honest. Yet, it didn’t have any impact on the forex market since it is in the past and the forex market mostly cares about what lies ahead, rather than what has already happened.

The Spanish GDP for Q2 ticked a point higher from Q1, to 0.9%. This number shows that the Spanish economy is expanding faster than most of its peers, but it´s coming from further behind, so this makes sense.

The Euro is doing a bit better this morning and the German regional GDP numbers are adding to the sentiment as well. They´re all beating expectations by 1 or 2 points, which is quite a big jump for just a single month.

Remember that inflation is what´s keeping the ECB (European Central Bank) on hold at the moment and I´m sure that the Germans will come screaming bloody murder again.

The Eurozone economic sentiment also jumped 0.4 points higher, so the economy is doing alright. This also means that the ECB will be forced to start tightening their monetary policy soon.

However, the market is not reacting much because the US GDP report is due in a few hours and everyone is waiting for that release, so we´ll hang on tight until then.