Economic Indicators Investors Should Watch This Week

There are some important emerging market economic indicators that investors should watch this week:

• US (SPX-INDEX) (SPY) retail sales
• the Eurozone (EZU) (VGK) ZEW economic sentiment index
• the German (EWG) ZEW economic sentiment index
• the Eurozone consumer confidence index
• US (QQQ) (IWM) inflation
• Eurozone inflation
• China’s (YINN) (FXI) retail sales

The iShares MSCI ACWI ETF (ACWI), which tracks the performance of the global market, has risen 1.2% in December 2017. If economic indicators rise, then we could see improvement in global markets.

Inflation figures are very important for market participants and policymakers. As major developed markets’ (EFA) central banks move towards a hawkish stance, inflation and labor market conditions have become important parameters

Improvement in retail sales is also a positive market driver, as it shows that consumer activity is improving. Improvement in the economic sentiment index indicates that economists have an optimistic short-term outlook. For more on the economy, read Stanley Druckenmiller on Apple: Not as Exciting as Amazon and Facebook.