Last week the releases of the FOMC’s and the ECB’s minutes from March meetings were in the spotlight. Fed’s members turned out to be dovish. However, this fact was not a surprise for the market which expected only one interest rate hike in the next 12 months. A dovish attitude was presented by the representatives of the ECB as well. They reiterated their readiness to take appropriate actions to restore the dynamic of price growth to 2%. Investors also learnt many important economic data. In the Eurozone, the reading of the unemployment rate and the retail sales did not disappoint investors.

In the last week of March there was a bearish market sentiment in Europe. French CAC40 fell by 1% and German DAX went down by 0.9%. Unlike to them, British FTSE250 rose by 0.5%. Investors learnt the confidence indices for the Eurozone. However, their values were lower than the market’s expectations. In addition, there were publications of the industrial PMI’s in the UE countries. The value of the index for the Eurozone stood at 51.6 pts. vs 51.4 pts. expected. In the US, the stock markets moved towards north – the NASDAQ took off by 3.1%, the S&P5600 increased by 1.8% and the DJI grew by 1.5%.

There was an Easter atmosphere in the financial markets last week. Furthermore, many global stock exchanges were opened until Thursday. Nevertheless, previous week was rich in economic data releases. In the Eurozone, the value of the consumer confidence index was higher than expected. In addition, the readings of the PMIs caught investors a little bit by positive surprise - the industrial PMI stood at 52.4 pts. vs 51.2 pts. expected and the services PMI amounted to 54 pts. vs 53.2 pts. expected. It is also worth paying attention to the Ifo Business Climate Index for Germany. It stood at 106.7 pts

Last week the Fed’s meeting was in the spotlight. The consensus forecast a low probability of interest rate raise, whereas did not rule out a council’s hawkish statement. The FOMC actually did not change the interest rate. However, the members of the committee revised their projections on inflations expectations. As a result, the Fed announced just two interest rate hikes by the end of the year. On the one hand, this information caused the US dollar’s depreciation but on the other, it also supported American stock market indices. In addition, investors learnt the dynamics of the US industrial production and the retail sales.

At the beginning of the last week most stock markets were in a sideways trend. Meanwhile, investors awaited the ECB’s decisions. The Governing Council did not disappoint them. The interest rates were cut and the quantitative easing was expanded. In addition, the ECB expanded the range of assets it will purchase to include high – quality corporate bonds. What is more, the ECB declared the launch of the TLTRO II program. As a result, stock markets grew sharply. Nevertheless, a little later Mario Draghi reiterated that further cuts of interest rates would not be anticipated.