Mark Pussard, Head of Risk, APM Capital
Commodities
Oil prices continued their week-long upward momentum on Friday, snapping a four-week losing streak, with Brent crude futures increasing to $79.66 a barrel. Similarly, US West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures prices rose to $76.18 per barrel. Both contracts gained around 3.70% and 4.50%, respectively, this week.
Gold prices eased on Friday as the latest jobs data eased concerns on U.S. recession, with prices set for a weekly decline after a global sell-off earlier in the week led to big losses in bullion, while traders awaited further clues on U.S. rate cuts. Spot gold was down 0.1% to $2,424.03 per ounce.
US market
US stocks edged higher on Friday, a day after stocks experienced their best trading day since November 2022.
The strongest day of gains in nearly two years came just two days after stocks experienced their worst trading day since September 2022.
The S&P 500 gained 25.11 points, or 0.47%, to end at 5,344.42 points, while the Nasdaq Composite gained 85.65 points, or 0.51%, to 16,745.67. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 49.86 points, or 0.13%, to 39,496.35. The yield on the 10-year Treasury fell to 3.94% from 3.99%.
European market
European stocks closed higher on Friday as global equity markets looked to rebuild from the recent sell-off.
As for European markets, the STOXX Europe 600 inched up 0.55% to 499.1 points. The German DAX index advanced 0.25% to 17,722 points, and the French CAC 40 index edged up 0.3% to 7,269 points. The British FTSE index also ended 0.3% higher at 8,168 points.
Asian market
Asian shares are ending a rough week on a high as Japanese stocks are close to recouping all of the huge losses from Monday, while the yen slipped again as markets pared back the chance of an outsized U.S. rate cut.
Japan’s Nikkei rose another 1.7% on Friday, tracking a strong rebound on Wall Street overnight. It erased most of a 13% crash on Monday and was set for a weekly drop of just 1.5%. Chinese blue-chip stocks rose 0.5%, and Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index jumped 1.4%.
Forex
The dollar hovered close to a one-week high against major rivals on Friday, after the biggest drop in U.S. jobless claims in close to a year allayed fears of a looming economic downturn.
The dollar index, which measures the currency versus the yen, Sissie, euro, sterling, and two other peers, was flat at 103.30 following three days of gains. It rose as high as 103.54 at one point overnight for the first time since Aug.
The euro was little changed at $1.0915, up 0.08% from a week ago. Sterling was steady at $1.2744, after a 0.49% rally overnight that yanked it back from a more than one-month low. The Aussie eased slightly to $0.6584 after earlier touching $0.65925 for the first time since July 24, given additional support from the Reserve Bank of Australia’s hawkish comments a day earlier.
