World Cup getting serious, Fed is in blackout

Tom Westbrook takes a look at the day ahead in European and global markets.

The World Cup is getting serious and the Fed is in a blackout.

The week's calendar is relatively light, leaving traders free to focus on soccer, except for the U.S. ISM services survey and European retail sales data on Monday, and central bank meetings in Canada and Australia later in the week.

The yuan jumped to the strong side of 7 per-dollar for the first time in 2-1 2 months due to the easing of China's strict COVID 19 curbs. The Hang Seng went up 3.5 per cent, and oil rose.

Positioning suggests that bets against the dollar are fairly light, and even lightened a bit last week.

There is still a lot of confusion and frustration on the ground in China. Beijing has dropped the testing requirements for public transport, but entry to many buildings still requires negative results.

Markets are optimistic about the momentum, though there are still protests here and there. Morgan Stanley was the latest investment house to turn bullish, on Monday.

Monday marks the beginning of the G 7's $60 a barrel price cap on Russian oil in Europe. It's not clear what that means for oil supply and prices, because Russia says it won't abide by the measure, even if that means cutting production.

On the pitch, Asia's last contenders, Japan and South Korea, take on Croatia and Brazil.

Markets could be affected by key developments that could affect markets on Monday: