U.S. stocks plummeted again yesterday, with the Dow shattering records with its steepest one-day point loss ever. What's more, the S&P 500 Index (SPX) dropped more than 4%, marking the second back-to-back loss of more than 1%. The last time the index suffered two such losses within a month of touching a record high was January 2015, according to data from Schaeffer's Senior Quantitative Analyst Ro...Read More
(Releads, adds RBS denial, details, business group response)By Emma Rumney and Lawrence WhiteLONDON, Feb 6 (Reuters) - Royal Bank of Scotland on Tuesday denied a British lawmaker's allegation that its executives misled a parliamentary committee over the extent to which the bank mistreated small businesses during and after the financial crisis.The chief executive and chairman of state-owned RBS we...Read More
NEW YORK, Feb 6 (Reuters) - The U.S. Treasury Department on Tuesday sold $26 billion of three-year government notes at a yield of 2.280 percent, which was the highest yield for the maturity at an auction since May 2007, Treasury data showed.The size of the latest three-year Treasury note auction , the first leg of this week's quarterly refunding, was $2 billion more than the prior three-year aucti...Read More
(New throughout, adds details of IPO, Argentine economic context)BUENOS AIRES, Feb 6 (Reuters) - Argentine biotechnology firm Bioceres SA on Tuesday extended by one day the offer period on its initial public offering in the U.S. market, as Wall Street shares edged higher after sharp recent losses but other global stock markets slid further.The company did not explain in a letter to the local stoc...Read More
* LME/ShFE arb: (Updates with closing prices)By Peter HobsonLONDON, Feb 6 (Reuters) - Prices of industrial metals fell on Tuesday as global stock markets plunged for a fourth day, prompting investors to cut exposure to riskier assets and strengthening the dollar. Global shares have lost $4 trillion in value from record highs in late January, while the dollar, seen as a safer asset, has risen from...Read More
NEW YORK, Feb 6 (Reuters) - Billionaire activist investor Carl Icahn warned on Tuesday that investors have exposure to "way too many derivatives" and called the stock market's nosedive just "rumblings of an earthquake.""The market is really not a place for the average person to be playing around with derivatives," Icahn said on CNBC. (Reporting by Jennifer Ablan; Edit...Read More
It's been a wild ride for U.S. stocks today. Following its worst session ever, the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJI) was down almost 570 points at its intraday low, but has since swung to a modest gain. The S&P 500 Index (SPX) and Nasdaq Composite (IXIC) have also been volatile, but were last seen pacing for a fourth straight down day. Meanwhile, the CBOE Volatility Index (VIX) -- or the stoc...Read More
LONDON, Feb 6 (Reuters) - Emerging equities have held up slightly better than their developed counterparts in a broad shake-out that began on Wall Street and has reverberated around the globe, though none have escaped the downdraft.Global equities have been in freefall since data on Feb. 2 showed the biggest U.S. wage growth since 2009, fuelling expectations of faster rate hikes to combat inflatio...Read More
(Adds quotes)WARSAW, Feb 6 (Reuters) - Poland's economy could suffer if it sees a reduction in European Union funds after 2021, Fitch Ratings lead analyst on Poland said on Tuesday.Arnaud Louis also told reporters that increased tensions between the EU and Poland on a range of issues including Warsaw's overhaul of its judiciary had so far not had much impact on investment."Rising intra-EU te...Read More
WASHINGTON, Feb 6 (Reuters) - U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Jay Clayton said on Tuesday he "can't really say" what caused the dramatic drop in stock prices during recent trading sessions, but that all signs indicate financial markets are functioning normally.Testifying before Congress, Clayton said from a functional perspective, markets appeared healthy on Monday when...Read More
While equities bounce here there and everywhere, rates FX and precious metals stay fairly zen.The popular short-vol ETN - XIV - will be liquidated on Feb 21.We take a look at the VIX Term structure & S&P Organic Vol.Market Intro CNBC: 10:50 AM EST For all the churning in equities (SPY, DIA, QQQ, IWM), movement in FX (UUP), rates (TLT, IEF, AGG) and PM (GLD, SLV) has been quite staid. Th...Read More
In light of stock market panic, would a dollar rally hinder gold?History shows that both gold and dollar can rally together.Gold's relative strength (vs. equities) is the key variable, however.For the first time in several months, gold is showing an increase in its relative strength versus the equity market. For reasons that have become abundantly clear, the metal's attraction as a financial s...Read More
Feb 6 (Reuters) - St. Louis Federal Reserve President James Bullard on Tuesday said he does not expect big changes in how monetary policy is managed under new Fed Chairman Jerome Powell."I don't see policy changing appreciably," Bullard told a conference in Lexington, Kentucky, adding that Powell would likely take economic data similarly into account as did his predecessors, Ben Bernanke...Read More
Following in the footsteps of fellow automakers General Motors (GM) and Toyota Motor (TM), Tesla Inc (NASDAQ:TSLA) is scheduled to report earnings after the close tomorrow, Feb. 7, and while the stock has a history of big one-day post-earnings swings, volatility expectations are even higher than normal this time around. For example, TSLA shares have averaged a single-session move of 4.7% after ear...Read More
(Recasts, updates prices, adds comment, changes byline, dateline; previous LONDON)By Gertrude Chavez-DreyfussNEW YORK, Feb 6 (Reuters) - Bitcoin recovered from three-month lows below $6,000 in choppy trading on Tuesday, but worries lingered about a global regulatory clampdown and moves by banks to ban buying bitcoin with credit cards.Investors swooped in after a steep fall. On the Luxembourg-base...Read More
PARIS, Feb 6 (Reuters) - French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire on Tuesday said a global market sell-off was an expected correction of high asset prices. Asked if he was worried as world stock markets nosedived for a fourth day running on Tuesday, Le Maire told reporters:"It's not a surprise. Some assets had reached very high prices and there is therefore a correction on stock markets."&...Read More
By Bruno FederowskiSAO PAULO, Feb 6 (Reuters) - Latin American markets moved little on Tuesday even as world stock markets nosedived for a fourth day, supported by expectations of strengthening global economic growth. Investors have scrambled for the exits after recent data on U.S. wage growth fueled expectations of faster interest rate hikes, driving 10-year U.S. Treasury yields to four-year high...Read More
Chip stocks, Micron Technology, Inc. (NASDAQ:MU) and Cirrus Logic, Inc. (NASDAQ:CRUS) were the target of a flurry of analyst attention this morning, after the Apple suppliers each gave earnings updates. Below, we'll take a closer look at the brokerage notes, and how MU and CRUS stocks are reacting.Micron Stock Upgraded After GuidanceAhead of its March 22 earnings report, Micron Technology raise...Read More
Airline giant United Continental Holdings, Inc. (NYSE:UAL) sold off sharply after its late-January earnings report, as traders reacted negatively to news that UAL plans to increase capacity and continue matching prices with lower-cost carriers. Following this big bear gap, the stock is now trading directly below its 10-month moving average and staring up at the convergence of its 40-day, 200-day,...Read More
By Ritvik CarvalhoLONDON, Feb 6 (Reuters) - A stock market drop triggered last week by a sharp rise in U.S. bond yields has snowballed into a global selloff and wiped $4 trillion off market capitalization worldwide.While the S&P 500 recorded its biggest daily drop in over six years on Monday, the biggest eye-catcher has been the spike in volatility, with Wall Street's "fear gauge" hi...Read More