LONDON (UK) – World stocks were on its way to take forward a five-day run of record highs on Thursday. Bitcoin took a breather after its latest surge and Russia’s markets struggled at the possibility of the toughest US sanctions in years.
Europe’s STOXX 600 set out with a new all-time high as a flurry of positive earnings overshadowed increasing worries about a third wave of COVID infections.
The US dollar was at a four-week low ahead before March retail sales, whereas in Europe a splurge of debt issuance boosted German bond yields to four-week highs.
The Russian rouble had already fallen as much as 2% on reports the United States would enforce sanctions later, with regard to alleged interference in US elections and malicious cyber activity.
“There has been a bit of whiplash for the rouble.” Saxo Bank’s head of FX strategy John Hardy said. “Earlier in the week it looked like the US was making overtures about a (Biden-Putin) summit and now it looks like they are going to slap on sanctions.”
JPMorgan Asset Management said in a note it was trimming its overall emerging markets exposure once again “mostly driven by a less sanguine outlook on EM Asia.”
Its global multi-asset strategist Patrik Schowitz wrote in a note, “China has now recovered enough that policymakers can afford to be more conservative and worry more about containing debt and property market risks.”
In spite of a shaky IPO for crypto firm Coinbase, Bitcoin was just shy of its record high at $62,614, which is now doubled in value this year.
Ten-year US bond yields relaxed to 1.6165% in European trade, down from a 14-month peak of 1.776% reached in late March,.
“Risk sentiment is improving,” which is dragging on bond yields and the dollar, said Osamu Takashima, chief currency strategist at Citigroup Global Markets Japan.
The dollar slipped for a fourth day to 108.90. The euro was flat at $1.1977 as was sterling at $1.3776.
The Australian dollar was revolving near three-week highs at $0.7716 after declaring its biggest one-day percentage gain since February 19 on Wednesday. Its New Zealand counterpart was upbeat at $0.7147, a level not seen since March 23.
Brent crude was up 2 cents at $66.60 a barrel. US crude saw a dip of 5 cents to $63.1. Gold was 0.4% higher at $1,741.8 an ounce.