Last week's news agenda was mostly positive. Published positive macroeconomic data strengthened investors' confidence in the prospects of economic activity renewal. The release of data on high profits of American companies improved risk sentiment, and top management is optimistic about the prospects for business (and the growth of the American economy).

Investors mostly played down news about failures with various vaccines, still elevated levels of coronavirus and rising geopolitical tensions.

• World Gold Council published the report on gold for the 1Q 2021

The World Gold Council has published a review of the precious metals market for the first quarter of 2021. It says that a strong increase in interest rates of US government bonds and the strengthening of the dollar has put pressure on the value of gold.

Last week, gold prices recovered to resistance levels of $1,775 per troy ounce amid a slowdown in US Treasury bond yields. The dollar also weakened, supporting the precious metals. There is still a downtrend in the longer term.

On the one hand, it causes the outflow of private investors from the gold ETFs, but on the other hand, the recovery of economic activity and the low price of the asset has allowed long-term investors to increase their positions in gold.

In January, India recorded a noticeable increase in retail demand, and in February, the further strengthening of demand was facilitated by a decrease in customs duties on gold imports, as well as an increase in the exchange rate of the Indian rupee.

China, which is the second largest consumer of gold in the world, also saw increased demand for the precious metal in January and February during the local New Year celebrations. Gold jewelery sales rose 161% in value terms during the holiday season. China's gold-backed ETFs also recorded capital inflows, unlike other regions.

• Oil

Last week, WTI oil rose significantly in price and reached the resistance level of $63. At the end of the week, oil rose by almost 5%.

This growth was driven by a number of optimistic factors that improve expectations for the supply and demand of raw materials in the market. The International Energy Agency has improved its forecast for growth in oil demand, and stocks in the United States fell sharply.

News of 18.3% GDP growth in China supported hopes of a recovery in oil demand.

• Bitcoin flash crash on Sunday

Bitcoin has been at its peak all week and was hoping to reach a new all-time high soon, however, early on Sunday morning, bitcoin experienced a sharp collapse of $10,000, triggering a liquidation worth more than $10 billion in the last 24 hours.

Possible reasons for the price decrease:

• Unconfirmed speculations indicate that the US Treasury may be charging multiple financial institutions for money laundering using cryptocurrencies. So far, this has not been officially reported anywhere (information appeared on Twitter).
• Another possible reason is related to the potential decrease in the hashrate of BTC mining. The drop in the hashrate of the leading bitcoin mining pools occurred due to problems with the supply of electricity after explosions and flooding in several provinces of China.
• Just the end of the bull market.

• Events of the week

Next week promises to be full of statistics and news.

In the US, economic data will remain in the spotlight as investors await further signals on the strength of the economy, with the latest reports on home sales and manufacturing activity taking the lead.

In Europe, the market is following the European Central Bank's monetary policy meeting to get further guidance on interest rates and stimulus.

Also on Wednesday, the Bank of Canada will publish interest rate data and a statement on monetary policy will be made.