The Business News Week Ahead

Sentiment readings will fill a busy global calendar beginning Monday with the Ifo survey from Germany followed on Tuesday with US consumer confidence, on Wednesday by France's business climate indicator and Thursday with Eurozone economic sentiment. Modest improvement for all but at still greatly depressed levels is the general consensus. New home sales in the US will be worth watching on Tuesday following the prior week's resales report that, despite lockdowns, showed resilient levels of demand. May flashes on European consumer prices will be posted late in the week including for Germany on Thursday where, in what may become an emerging trend, monthly deflation and yearly disinflation are the calls. Late in the week will be key April manufacturing updates, first durable goods orders in the US then Japanese industrial production – substantial declines would no surprise. And a substantial decline is the call for German retail sales on Friday which will be followed by numbers on US goods trade where a steady gap could mask major declines on both sides of the import/export ledger. But the most important news of all is certain to be Thursday once again and how many millions of Americans continue to file initial jobless claims.