The market rallied significantly in Thursday’s trading as word got around that Greece had essentially secured a deal with existing private sector bondholders in a swap deal devaluing Greek debt by nearly 75 cents on the dollar. Still, the general consensus among investors was: if you can avoid a default, that’s good enough for us.
With Greece taken care of and essentially out of the way in the short term, all eyes are watching Friday’s jobs number. If it beats expectations, traders expect a bull market rally to continue for some time to come. The combination of the (temporary) end of a Greek debt crisis combined with positive market data will be a boon for traders, who expect better-than-average volumes.
However, things could go the other way. Regardless of the jobs number, uncertainty remains with regard to the debt situations in other European countries. Should a country like Italy or Portugal come out with bad news, it would be a disaster for the recovering equity markets. "It'd be disasterous," said one proprietary trader.