U.S. equities continue to push back their historic highs. Investors have taken comfort in the prospect of a possible U.S. stimulus deal and the hope for a more rapid rollout of vaccines. However, the Covid-19 crisis is worsening in the United States, with talks of partial lockdowns.

The dollar is expected to continue its decline, especially after the Federal Reserve this week reiterated a very accommodating and risk-oriented stance. Talks for a stimulus plan are progressing and if an agreement is reached today, it should be approved by Congress this weekend.

In Europe, the negotiations for the Brexit are still ongoing, with a new deadline being set for Sunday, and disagreements on fishing rights remain persistent.

Meanwhile, Donald Trump has banned access to American capital for another Chinese company. After the smartphone giant Huawei or the surveillance camera manufacturer Hikvision, it is now the turn of the largest Chinese manufacturer of SMIC electronic chips to be targeted by these accusations of collaboration with the Chinese army.

Today, for this session of the four witches. In March, investors were mostly in agreement that the coronavirus was going to cause the worst economic crisis in modern history. In the end, financial markets were incredibly solid, even if the performances were quite disparate. This is the balance sheet that can be drawn up when the last 2020 compensation is looming today, i.e the stock market day that sees the monthly and quarterly options expire, commonly known as the session of the four witches.

On another topic, we now know that a cyber-attack on an unprecedented scale, even historic for some, began several months ago. It took advantage, as is often the case, of a security flaw in a piece of software, in this case the SolarWinds Orion platform, which served as a gateway to bring Sunburst malware into networks from an update. The operation, which dates back to last spring, only emerged very recently when the cyber security firm FireEye discovered that its own systems had been compromised.

This means that the attackers, almost certainly a "state organization" and most likely a talented Russian team, were able to gain unnoticed access to sensitive information within companies and government agencies in the United States, and by extension elsewhere in the world, for several months. At this stage, the attack has the characteristics of a large-scale espionage operation, and not an offensive designed to destroy data, paralyze a system or make the victim pay, as those that have struck Maersk or Altran in recent years. But who knows what will happen next? The list of known victims is frighteningly long, ranging from Microsoft to major US government agencies. After this atypical year 2020, financiers have tended to emphasize on health and well-being, ESG or education as fundamental themes for investment. This is consensual. But let's not forget cybersecurity.

Today on the agenda, we have German producer prices and British retail sales, the German Ifo in December and the US leading indicator index.