After yesterday's speech by Janet Yellen which signaled a path of steady interest rate increases and was perceived as hawkish, the dollar rebounded, Asian shares slipped and government bond yields jumped to multi-week highs on Thursday.
European shares decline led by a plunge in Pearson shares, S&P futures were modestly in the green as Asian and EM stocks gained. The dollar rebounded against most major currencies after retreating 1.3% on Tuesday to the lowest in a month following Trump's "strong dollar" comments and halted a seven-day drop against the yen.
As we observed in yesterday morning's market wrap, while US traders took the day off for the MLK holiday, China was busy defending an accelerating selloff across its stock markets.
As traders get to the their desks this morning after a 3-day weekend, only to find a market bombarded by a barrage of overnight news from around the globe even as Theresa May is currently delivering her Brexit speech, (so far the most impotant thing she has said is that both houses of parliament will vote on Brexit, leaving a door open that Brexit may not happen at all), here courtesy of JPM's Adam Crisafulli is a recap of all the chaos that has taken place so far.
South Korea political crisis spilled over into the corporate sector overnight, when the country's special prosecutor on Monday sought a warrant to arrest the head of Samsung Group, the country's largest conglomerate, accusing him of paying multi-million dollar bribes to a friend of impeached President Park Geun-hye.
Samsung Electronics vice chairman Jay Y. Lee