Almost all of Asia Pacific major indices fell on Wednesday morning (18 Oct, 9:30 AM, GMT+7, Bangkok time) after mixed US retails, industrial production data and especially, the ban that prevented the GPU maker Nvidia from exporting to China. All these caused volatility to spike during the opening of the US session last night. Meanwhile, this morning China Q3 GDP was announced at 4.9% YoY, better than the expected 4.4%. Even so, it didn’t push the markets much as the financial concerns on China’s economy still continued.
Shenzhen’s SZI was a loss leader today with 0.84% to 9,856.32. Shanghai’s SSEC followed with a 0.47% drop to 3,068.95. Singapore’s STI also edged down by 0.44% to 3,158, while other major indices dropped by a lesser percentage except Australia’ ASX 200 that rose by 0.3% to 7,077.2.
On the other hand, last night the US stock market swung down and up but closed at around the same level as the opening. Dow Jones (DJIA) edged up by 0.04% to 33,997.65. NASDAQ dipped by 0.25% to 13,533.75 and S&P 500 also dipped by 0.01% to 4,373.2, while VIX jumped by 3.89% to 17.88.
In addition, last night commodities Futures were also volatile as US President Joe Biden announced that he would visit Israel, causing WTI to go up to $87.18 and Brent rose to $90.33 per barrel. Both still continued to climb in the morning as WTI crude oil jumped by another 2.57% to $88.89, while Brent also jumped by 2.29% to $91.96 per barrel and the gold price was up by 0.91% to $1,953.3 per Troy ounce as tension in the Middle East escalated.
Furthermore, the longer-term US treasury yields dropped in contrast to the shorter-term amid the above situation. As for this morning the 1-year yield rose by 0.016 ppt to 5.502%, the 10-year also dropped by 0.015 ppt to 4.832%.
