As Trump makes one of the most retarded economic decisions of all times with his blanket tariffs (even on uninhabited islands, but not Russia curiously), in effect self-sanctioning the USA from global trade, risk markets have done their fair share of pearl clutching and crystal ball gazing to wonder if stagflation, recession or something else entirely is coming down the road as a result.
Asian share markets have broadly followed post close Wall Street futures and dumped almost everywhere, with Japanese stocks the hardest hit due to the stupid tariff formula applied while local stocks are doing somewhat better after a shaky start. The USD is giving up a lot of ground against most of the major currency pairs, particularly Yen but also the Loonie as the Canadians were somewhat spared while the Australian dollar is back where it started after a very volatile 12 hours hovering around the 63 cent level.
Oil markets have pulled back after recently building some really good upside momentum with Brent crude back below the $73USD per barrel level while gold also continues to push higher, now soaring to the $3150USD per ounce level as the USD is loosing its lustre:
Mainland Chinese share markets are still down in afternoon trade after a very bad start with the Shanghai Composite off by 0.5% while the Hang Seng Index has lost at least 1.5%, currently at 22835 points. Japanese stock markets are having the worst of it with the Nikkei 225 down at least 3% to 34595 points while the USDPY pair has fallen over 200 pips (so far!) in response to the Trump tariffs with a return to the 147 level:
Australian stocks have again been the best performing but its all relative with the ASX200 about to close nearly 1% lower at 7863 points while the Australian dollar has basically returned to its pre tariff level after a wild ride in the last 12 hours:
S&P and Eurostoxx futures are down significantly with Wall Street about to have some compunctions on the open tonight as the dead count bounce fully rolls over here on the S&P500 four hourly chart showing a return to below the previous lows of the post election breakdown:
The economic calendar doesn’t really matter anymore. It will just be a cavalcade of countries reacting to the Trump regime’s tariff onslaught. Oh there’s non-farm payrolls tomorrow night but they don’t really matter either.