Greater London, England -- (SBWire) -- 12/03/2010 -- Market Analyst Nick Serff of spread betting and CFD trading provider City Index (http://www.cityindex.co.uk) takes a look at activity facing the financial markets for 1st December:

"U.S. Consumer Confidence and Chicago Purchasing Managers index for November helped lift some of the European debt gloom from earlier today, and push the FTSE and DAX back into flat-positive territory at the close.

The general theme of the day has been one of caution with traders refusing to bargain hunt despite Indices now off as much as 6%. Clearly the European sovereign debt crisis is weighing on investors’ minds, handicapping appetite for risk and we have only really seen minimal bouts of buying into the mining sector, purely on the back of Copper prices rising almost 2% on the day.

U.S. Consumer Confidence managed to beat market forecasts and rise to 54.1 in November, the highest reading for the index since June as consumers became more optimistic about the US economy. The U.S. manufacturing sector also showed continued signs of expansion with PMI coming in at 62.5, higher than the 60 reading economists had expected.

Euro troubles remain as EUR/USD breaks below $1.30

The Euro continues to be aggressively sold off by investors who continue to fear sovereign debt issues will spread throughout the euro zone with Spain and Portugal next on the potential target list. Today we saw the euro break below $1.30 against the dollar, a level not seen since mid September.

Investors are hopeful that the euro could find some psychological support at this level and indeed we did see traders come in to buy the euro on a short term basis throughout the afternoon lifting prices back above the $1.30 mark. That said, with debt fears still raging in the market, prices could remain fairly volatile throughout the week."

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