All economists will be keeping their eyes on Christine Lagarde and the European Central Bank next week as it looks to beat both the US and UK in slashing interest rates.
On Thursday the central bank will meet to set interest rates and the consensus is that it will cut from 4.5% to 4.25%.
It comes after five consecutive meetings in which borrowing rates were kept at 22-year highs.
While a rate cut is considered certain, a majority of economists polled by Reuters believe that two further reductions will occur in September and December of this year.
Friday could see the positive feeling in Europe continue as the EU posts fresh GDP estimates for the first quarter, with analysts predicting that the economy will have risen by 0.4%, improving from the 0.1% in the previous quarters.
Meanwhile, in the UK, election chatter will mean next week’s PMIs, retail data and Halifax house price index will likely be placed under the microscope by both parties.
Any data indicating that the economy is showing healthy signs will probably be lauded by the Tories, while any figures which indicate the opposite will be the talk of Labour politicians.
House prices are expected to have increased by 3.1% in May from a 1.1% rise in April, while retail sales for the month are predicted to rise by 2.8%.
Over in the US, when they are not reacting to Trump’s guilty verdict, economists will be looking at several indicators of the health of the jobs market.
A robust jobs market, along with sticky inflation, has been a key driving force in the Federal Reserve’s decision to maintain interest rates.
“As markets continue to wonder when – and hope that – interest rates will come down, they will continue to study the macroeconomic data just as intently as policymakers, even if this ‘data dependent’ stance increases the risk of policy error,” Russ Mould at AJ Bell said.
“Either way, the coming week’s rash of jobs data is bound to attract plenty of headlines.”