1) Bitcoin drops below $34,000 amid plummet in equity markets
Bitcoin continued to decline, dropping below $34,000 for the first time in nearly a year amid plummet in the global stock market last week, especially on Thursday when the Dow Jones dropped more than 1,000 points while Nasdaq plunged by 5%. The cryptocurrency has lost more than 50% from the high and 26% this year.
The plummet came after the U.S. Federal Reserve announced a 0.50 percentage point interest rate hike last week and planned to start quantitative tightening to ease a four-decade high inflation rate.
2) John Lee to become Hong Kong’s chief after Carrie Lam
John Lee, former Hong Kong’s chief secretary, won the vote on Sunday to become the next Hong Kong’s chief executive. He will start his job on July 1, 2022, replacing outgoing Chief Executive Carrie Lam.
Lee won the election with 1,416 votes from about 1,500 members of a largely pro-Beijing election committee.
3) Global stocks lost $2 trillion in market cap last week
Global stocks lost another $2 trillion in market capitalization last week as the tech bubble continues to lose more air and as investors digested the first 50bp rate hike from the U.S. Federal Reserve in 20 years, while bond yields soared to 3.139%.
Dow Jones lost 0.24% in the past five days, while S&P 500 slipped 0.18% and Nasdaq dropped 1.52% into a bear market.
