European markets retain a bearish tone after their worst weekly showing since February
Wall Street equities rebounded on Friday to end sharply higher despite mixed economic data. Consumer spending jumped by 0.8% versus +0.7% expected while the personal consumption expenditure price index climbed 0.4% in August, the sixth straight increase. Furthermore, the rate of inflation in the 12 months edged up to 4.3%, the highest rate in 30 years. The S&P 500 gained 1.15% while the Dow Jones and the Nasdaq Composite added 1.43% and 0.82%, respectively.
Asian markets were mixed-to-lower on Monday. The Hang Seng in Hong Kong plunged over 2% after China Evergrande’s shares were suspended from trading. According to the latest reports, a rival company was buying 51% of Evergrande’s property services unit. Tokyo’s Nikkei 225 dropped 2.65% while Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 gained 1.25%. Markets were closed for holidays in Shanghai and South Korea.
In Europe, equities opened lower today, retaining a bearish tone after their worst weekly showing since February. On the data front, Eurozone’s October Sentix investor confidence index came in at 16.9 versus 19.0 expected, to slip to a six-month low. The current conditions index fell from 30.8 in September to 26.3 while the expectations index fell from 9.0 to 8.0, the fifth straight month of decline.
In currencies, the dollar looks offered nearly across the board on Monday despite the risk-off tone prevails in the global markets at the beginning of the week. Further losing momentum, the USD index slipped to fresh local lows below the 94.00 figure in a corrective move from new 2021 highs registered on September 30. As such, EURUSD bounced from mid-2020 lows around 1.1560 to regain the 1.1600 figure in recent trading. However, the pair is yet to confirm the latest recovery on a daily closing basis, with downside risks persisting.
