By: Noha El Nahhas

Cairo - Mubasher: Investors expect new important economic events this week, including which is slated for Friday, 24 November in the US, but has conclude in other parts of the world like China. Other events this week include the US Federal Reserve's meeting and speeches by central bank presidents.

Central bank presidents’ speeches

European Central Bank (ECB) president Mario Draghi will deliver a speech on Monday before the European Parliament in Brussels.

"As the economy continues to recover, a constant policy stance will become more accommodative, and the central bank can accompany the recovery by adjusting the parameters of its policy instruments – not in order to tighten the policy stance, but to keep it broadly unchanged," Draghi said last week.

Earlier in October, the ECB said it will reduce its bond purchases to EUR 30 billion starting from January 2018. The ECB’s current bond purchases amount to EUR 60 billion per month.

Draghi noted that the bank’s decision to extend bond buying until next September was a key step to reinforce the market’s expectations on the interest rate hike for the first time in the future.  

Federal meeting

The Federal Reserve will announce the minutes of its last policy meeting on Wednesday, after it kept interest rates unchanged.

Although the Fed held its key interest rate steady, another rate hike is forecast ahead of the 2017-end. .

In September, the Fed started trimming bond holdings by $10 billion a month as of October.

Black Friday

Retailers are awaiting Black Friday which comes after the Thanksgiving holiday and continues until the Monday after.

Black Friday marks the beginning of the Christmas shopping season and begins on Friday, 24 November in the US.

The US National Retail Federation expects that the number of shoppers to reach around 164 million or 69% of the American population.

Britain's Budget

 UK finance minister Philip Hammond will deliver Britain’s Autumn Budget on Wednesday,  amid a crunch on the Brexit bill that Britain must pay to the European Union (EU) before its departure.   

Previous reports stated that British prime minister Theresa May plans to increase the Brexit bill by GBP 20 billion ($26 billion).

European Parliament president Martin Schulz said that the UK has to pay at least EUR 60 billion ($69.9 billion) to the EU in order to cover its obligations  before Brexit.

Translated by: Kholoud Mohamed Hussein