S&P futures rebounded shortly after the stronger than expected European CPI print, rising 0.3% to 2,426, as markets try to forget all about yesterday's brief 50% VIX surge and tech rout, which trimmed the seventh consecutive quarterly gain for the S&P 500 Index to 2.4%. Europe shares rose 0.4%, led by tech stocks, after a drop in Asian markets, as oil and the dollar gained.
The euro soared to the highest level in over a year while bond yields and global shares also climbed, as an ongoing barrage of coordinated hawkish comments from central banks signaled the era of easy money might be coming to an end for more than just the United States. S&P futures were fractionally in the green following the best day for US equities in two months, as banks climbed after passing the Fed's stress tests and announcing bigger than expected shareholder payouts.
Yesterday morning we discussed the sudden crashes amid 17 small cap Hong Kong firms, which collectively lost over $6 billion in market cap, on what we dubbed was a marketwide margin call, as confidence in the entire sector vaporized instantly, sending the small cap Growth Enterprise Market (GEM) plunging by over 9%, with some stocks plunging over 90%. Quoted by Bloomberg, Francis Lun, the CEO of HK's Geo Securities said “we’re seeing a domino effect; all the companies in the same network got cut.
U.S. index futures point to a slightly higher open, as markets in both Europe and Asian fall.The EUR surges to one year highs as markets continue to reverberate from Draghi's hawkish comments while yields rose around the globe following similar hawkish comments from Fed speakers on Tuesday.
Chinese factory activity contracted last month for the first time in nearly a year when the Caixin PMI dipped below 50, the threshold for growth. And now, early indicators for the month of June – including one satellite-based measure - suggest that there’s more pain ahead for the manufacturing sector in the world’s second-largest economy.