Well that didn’t last. The rebound we saw early this week in US stocks has been thoroughly undone, due in part to poor earnings. The Nasdaq in particular fared terribly as it fell 2.43% on Wednesday, before losing a further 1.76% the following day. Quarter-on-quarter GDP growth rate figures may have compounded matters, coming in higher than expected at 4.9%. The downturn extended to the S&P 500, falling 1.43% on Wednesday then 1.18% on Thursday. Not even the Dow Jones was spared, itself seeing declines of 0.32% and 0.76%. It will be interesting to see how Asian markets react on Friday as we close the week on the back foot once again.
USDJPY finally closed above the dreaded 150 level on Wednesday, after threatening to do so all month. The recent strength in the greenback proved to be too much as the pair closed at 150.2 on Wednesday then climbed again to just under 150.4 on Thursday. The Japanese Yen has had a rough year so far, down almost 15% versus the Dollar. The Bank of Japan is in a difficult position, it does not have the flexibility to fight off challenges from the USD because any attempt to do so will impact the little economic growth achieved so far via easy monetary policy. There are expectations of an intervention at some level, but for now we can only speculate on what that level may be.
With the Dollar still not showing any signs of weakness, and interest rate hikes not on the table for the time being, other central banks around the world will also want to have some kind of contingency plan in place.
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