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A soft’ish night for European equities in the aftermath of the Greek bailout deal, with European manufacturing mixed-to-still-soft in February, dovish Bank of England (BoE) minutes from this month’s meeting, and some counter-balance from another positive piece of data on US housing was not enough to push the Dow up through 13,000.

The Euro-zone purchasing managers' manufacturing index (PMIs) were expected to inch back up toward the 50 growth threshold level but it was not to be. The flash Euro-zone Manufacturing PMI for February came in at 49.0, virtually unchanged from January’s 48.8, if less worse than Quarter 4’s 46.8 average. So still weak if a little less so.

In the UK, the BoE minutes revealed that two of the nine Monetary Policy Committee members wanted to increase quantitative easing by £75 billion at this month’s meeting, more than the £50 billion agreed to, the other seven (and the majority of the Committee) deciding on £50 billion. This keeps the pressure on for more quantitative easing should the UK economy soften further.

There is also the reality of the still hugely uncomfortable road ahead for Greece with a reminder from ratings agency Fitch overnight. Fitch downgraded Greece’s rating after the bailout from CCC to C, saying it will assign Greece a “Restricted Default” after the Greek debt restructuring, now set for March 12. Euro bonds spreads to German bunds (bonds) widened overnight.

Relatively quiet data and event wise today. We've had Luci Ellis (Reserve Bank of Australia) first thing speaking on the importance of sound mortgage lending to financial stability, followed later this morning by Average Weekly Earnings wages data, second tier data.

Tonight there is the German IFO survey for February (a super-important monthly release for Germany), followed in the US by weekly jobless claims, house prices and Kansas City manufacturing index for February.