Barclays (LON: BARC) share price has dropped to fresh weekly lows as the selling pressure in UK stocks increased on Wednesday. Shares of other major banks also tumbled as the benchmark FTSE 100 index lost more than 43 points.
On Wednesday, the oil price also had a pullback during its London session. The UK benchmark Brent was down 0.41% till press time. This caused a pullback in energy stocks. Barclays shares were also affected by the negative sentiment and were down 1.46% after a few hours of trading.
According to the latest news, Barclays is set to release its Q2 2023 earnings tomorrow. Due to high interest rates in the country, the bank is expected to post good results for the second quarter. However, the weakness shown by the shares just a day before earnings is not a good sign.
Despite today’s pullback, Barclays share price remains more than 14% up from its June 2023 lows. Due to the FOMC announcement, the price action is expected to remain volatile for the rest of the day. Analysts are expecting the US Federal Reserve to hike the interest rates by another 25 bps.
The following LON: BARC chart shows that the shares are trading above the midpoint of the current trading range. A closer look at the chart reveals that the 200-day moving average lies very close to this level at 159p. This suggests there could be a strong demand around the 158p-159p region due to these confluences.
The short-term Barclays share price forecast will remain positive as long as the shares trade above 200 MA. A breakdown below this level will invalidate the bullish price target of 178p. The future price action depends on how the investors react after tomorrow’s earnings report. The current estimated EPS is 0.41p.
In the meantime, I’ll keep sharing the updated Barclays stock forecast and my personal trades on my Twitter, where you are welcome to follow me.
This post was last modified on Jul 26, 2023, 12:14 BST 12:14