Vicky McKeever writes:

Shares in electric vehicle company Tesla (TSLA) fell 4.8% on Monday, with the stock now down 41% since the start of the year.

Shares have halved in value, as of Monday's closing price of $238, since hitting an all-time high closing price of $479.86 in December on the back of US president Donald Trump's election win.

Tesla (TSLA) CEO Elon Musk has faced increasing backlash over his involvement with the Trump administration, heading up the the so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE). His cost-cutting initiative across federal agencies, seeing mass layoffs, has sparked protests at Tesla dealerships across the US.

Meanwhile, data released last month has shown falling sales in Tesla (TSLA) in Europe, where Musk has also made high-profile inventions in politics.

The Financial Times reported on Tuesday, that short sellers had made $16bn in profit from betting against Tesla (TSLA) shares.

Tesla shares were down nearly 1% in pre-market trading on Monday, which came as Chinese EV maker BYD (002594.SZ) unveiled a new ultra-fast five-minute charging system.

The pound is higher against the dollar in early European trading, touching $1.30, a level it had not breached since November.

The uptick is largely attributed to a weaker dollar, which has come under pressure in recent weeks. The US dollar index (DX-Y.NYB), which tracks the greenback against a basket of six major currencies, is down almost 6% from a two-year peak set in mid-January amid worries that Donald Trump's tariffs and retaliatory measures from other countries could push the US economy into a recession.

Volatility around sterling is expected this week, particularly with the Bank of England’s upcoming policy meeting on Thursday. Investors will be keenly watching for any indications on interest rates, with expectations that the central bank will keep rates unchanged at 4.5%.

Meanwhile, sterling was lower against the euro (GBPEUR=X) on Tuesday morning, at €1.1870.

Trustpilot is rallying in early trade in London, up around 1% as of the time of writing.

AJ Bell investment director Russ Mould said:

Pedro Goncalves writes:

The Bank of England (BoE) is widely expected to keep interest rates steady at 4.5% on Thursday, as it navigates the fallout from US president Donald Trump’s trade war and mixed signals from the UK economy.

Since August last year, the BoE has been gradually reducing borrowing costs, offering some relief to mortgage holders. At its February meeting, the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) voted 7-2 in favour of a rate cut to 4.5%.

However, governor Andrew Bailey has stressed the importance of a “gradual and careful approach” to further rate cuts.

Markets indicate a 95% chance of a rate hold this month, with a 77% probability of a cut at the MPC’s May meeting and a 55.6% likelihood of a reduction in August. This marks a significant shift from January, when traders only expected one rate cut for the year, in February, according to Morningstar.

Read more on Yahoo Finance UK

In a yearly update to the basket of items the Office for National Statistics (ONS) uses to calculate UK price rises, pulled pork, virtual reality headsets and yoga mats have been added to the calculation, while local newspaper adverts and DVD rental prices have been taken out.

The virtual basket contains over 700 carefully selected items representative of the goods and services that consumers typically spend their money on.

The inflation basket is updated once a year by the ONS to take account of the changing tastes and habits of UK consumers and to ensure the official yardstick of the cost of living is as accurate as possible. This year, VR headsets make their way into the basket for the first time.

"As a rapidly emerging technology, we have seen growing expenditure on this item, which is expected to continue," the ONS said.

Read more on Yahoo Finance UK

China announced a plan to "boost consumption" over the weekend. Neil Wilson, analyst at TipRanks, breaks it down:

Nvidia stock futures are currently up around 0.7% ahead of the GTC.

Our US team writes:

Nvidia (NVDA) kicks off its annual GTC conference on March 18 with a keynote by CEO Jensen Huang from the SAP Center in San Jose, Calif. The event, which runs through March 21, will feature workshops and training for developers and engineers, panels and discussions related to AI and robotics, and exhibits from companies showing off how they're using Nvidia's products in the real world.

Huang is expected to debut the company's latest flagship AI chip: the Blackwell Ultra. A souped-up version of Nvidia's existing Blackwell chip, Blackwell Ultra should get a performance boost over last year's chip to further speed up training and running AI models.

We should also learn more about Nvidia's next-generation GPU platform, dubbed Rubin, and the successor to its Grace line of CPUs, Vera. The combined superchip will be called Vera Rubin, named for the American astronomer, and will take the place of the current Grace Blackwell superchip at the top of Nvidia's hierarchy of AI processors.

During Nvidia's fourth quarter earnings call, Huang teased that he'd also discuss the follow-up to Rubin. Nvidia, like most chip companies, is known for providing a broad look at its roadmap to help customers and developers prepare for their upcoming products.

Read more on Yahoo Finance

Gold (GC=F) continues to hover around the $3,000 all-time high. Haven demand continues to be pushed worldwide as market volatility rattles investors. It hit its stride in early trade, eheading 0.7% higher.

Bloomberg reported:

From our US team:

US stock future slide after Wall Street digested a second day of gains and braced for the Federal Reserve's next policy meeting.

Futures attached to the Dow Jones Industrial Average (YM=F) fell 0.2%, the benchmark S&P 500 (ES=F) slid 0.3%, and the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite (NQ=F) slumped 0.5%.

On Monday, stocks continued to recover from last week's sell-off, which saw the S&P 500 enter correction territory amid concerns about the US economy's ability to sustain President Donald Trump's trade war.

Wall Street's attention is now turning to the Federal Reserve's two-day policy meeting, which kicks off on Tuesday. The central bank will announce its next monetary policy decision Wednesday.

Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell has said that the central bank will exercise caution when it comes to rate cuts and seek out more economic data. The Fed is largely expected to hold rates steady this week.

Hello from London. Lucy Harley-McKeown here, ready to bring you the latest business news and updates on what's moving markets.

This morning there'll be UK consumer price updates, as well as new information about what's changed in the way the ONS calculates price rises for goods.

Today will also bring the German ZEW economic survey and data on US housing.

Let's get to it.