Australia: The Australian Dollar has opened firmer this morning, trading around 1.0150 after touching a high of 1.0185 during Friday night's offshore session.

Global equity markets finished firmer as oil concerns eased.The Dow finished 0.6% higher while the S&P finished up 1.1%.

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After last week's concerns over the tension in the Middle East, in particular Libya, oil reached $100.00 per barrel however comments from Saudi Arabia, Russia and the US regarding oil stock reserves were in abundance eased this issue.

Base metals posted gains on Friday night with copper up 2.75%, nickel up 2.5% and zinc up 0.8%.

We see the AUD remaining firm for the time being and may test 1.0200 as strong demand on dips continues, especially given the turnaround last week when the USD was sold as risk aversion increased.

A one off or a new trend? We think a one off, as it related specifically to oil concerns.

The RBA meet tomorrow and the market expects the rates to remain on hold, and as always, attention to comments in the accompanying statement will be scrutinised.

A plethora of economic data today around the world will keep the foreign exchange markets busy.

Majors: As mentioned above, equity markets posted gains on Friday as oil concerns eased and positive data releases in the US buoyed sentiment.

The US Michigan Consumer Confidence for February was revised upwards to 77.5 from 75.1. On the company front, Boeing's win of a US$30bn airforce tanker deal saw its shares rise 2.2%.

There is plenty of data out this week around the world, which will likely see market volatility increase.

Libya will remain the focus, especially given the US's announcement for Colonel Gaddafi to "step down" and their backing of UN's freezing of his assets around the Western World.

A raft of date releases this week culminate in the always important non-farm payrolls report for February on Friday with the market predicting an slight lift in unemployment to 9.1% and a result of 175k new jobs.

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