Hi, my name is Carl Rogan and every Monday morning I will be bringing you my views of what happened during the previous week and what to look out for in the coming week.
My views are my own and they do not constitute investment advice. My views are derived from Equiduct’s unique data set which represents a clean retail signal free of distortion from institutional investors and therefore are telling of what the sentiment of European retail investors is.
Without further ado, let’s dive right into it!
Last week …
Was a bit of a mixed bag. It started slowly on Monday, with reasonable volumes Tuesday through to Thursday and was capped off with a surge in activity on Friday afternoon.
Not a bad week for Equiduct with volumes of €2.8billion. Friday was the tenth busiest trading day in the company’s history and four of those ten days have occurred in 2026.
Madrid was the most traded market on Monday and Tuesday before turning much quieter over the second part of the week.
Paris took over top spot on Wednesday and finished the week strongly. Paris turnover topped a billion euros by the end of the week making it the most traded market on Equiduct last week.
Friday’s surge in activity was down to Iran declaring the Strait of Hormuz “open”. But the US is still blockading Iranian ports, so the situation is very fluid. I was again surprised by market optimism on Friday.
Santander was once again our most traded stock last week but only marginally from ASML in second. Q1 earnings results bolstered ASML’s numbers and ensured Hermes was our most traded stock on Wednesday.
Alstom was the most traded stock on Friday after withdrawing their cashflow forecast and shedding a third of their value.
Energy companies, unsurprisingly, continue to be heavily traded with Total Energies and Repsol in the top five traded once more.
This week …
Has a similar feel to last week about it in that it’s hard to see which way it will go. The Middle East conflict will almost certainly be the main driver of volatility again but Q1 earnings season will play a bigger role this week.
The markets seem to be desperate to jump on any positive news regarding a possible peace agreement. We’ve had a couple of false dawns already and there are so many different factors at play, it’s hard to give too much weight to anything at the moment. By the end of last week, the S&P 500 was at a record high which just seems a bit crazy right now.
European markets have been impacted harder by the spiking oil prices but most major indices aren’t far off recovering most of the recent losses already. Feels to me like a lot of people have their head in the sand a little bit and I wouldn’t be surprised to see a correction in markets before too long.
We also have economic data due across a number of markets this week. Inflation numbers will be released for the UK and Japan, we’ll have an update from the German ZEW Index, Retail sales numbers from the US and PMI flash updates from several European countries.
I’m expecting a fair bit of Q1 earnings season volatility too this week. IBM and Tesla will announce results in the US whilst in Europe, Bankinter, SAP, Roche, Nestle, Safran and L’Oreal are a sample of stocks set to release results.
I might be wrong but I’m going to predict that this week will be busier than last. There will be a lot of different news for investors to digest and Q1 earnings season is now in full swing. Markets seem to be reacting sharply to any news from the Middle East, but I do wonder how much longer that will last before lethargy sets in. It should be an interesting week ahead.
That’s all from me, until next week… Happy investing!
Carl
