(08 JUNE 2020)DAILY MARKET BRIEF 1:Equities bid on surprise NFP

<p>The global risk rally was boosted on Friday by surprise increase in US nonfarm payrolls, talks of a merger between two pharmaceutic giants, AstraZeneca and Gilead fighting against the coronavirus, and the agreement among the OPEC+ countries to extend the historical production cut by a month. The NFP data revealed on Friday that the US economy added 2.5 million new nonfarm jobs in May, versus 8 million job losses expected by analysts. Though the average hourly earnings turned negative (-1.0%), the surprise jump in US jobs supported the idea that the recovery post-Covid-19 would be faster than earlier thought. News that the pharmaceutical giant AstraZeneca made a preliminary approach to Gilead, which has been developing Remdesivir – the only US approved treatment against Covid-19, should wet pharma investors’ appetite at the start of this week. Although talks between the two companies are not formal yet, the possibility of the biggest pharmaceutical merger in history will give a boost to</p>