Now AI Risks Are Back In Focus, As Markets Bet On Positive Hormuz Outcomes…

This is our weekly market update where we start in the US cross to Europe and Asia and end in Australia, covering commodities and crypto along the way. It was another complex week on the markets, with the MSCI Global index down 2.07%, while the All Asia Ex Japan was down 5.22%. The European STOXX 600 was flat for the week, having slide on Friday, while the ASX 200 fell for the week down 0.7%, but lifted slightly on Friday. Diplomatic efforts in the Middle East are being taken positively and so oil prices are continuing to slump, with Brent futures down another 9.3% for the week, and last at $73.60, while WTI dropped to $69.23, down 9.52%. This despite further skirmishes in the straits at the end of the week, suggests the geopolitical risk premium has been effectively removed despite the complexity of a peace agreement, and the possibility of further kinetic action. President Donald Trump on Friday said Iran shot at least four drones at ships transiting the critical Strait of Hormuz and hit one cargo vessel, in what he called a "foolish violation" of the ceasefire agreement between Washington and Tehran. The US responded in a limited way hitting selected military targets in Iran. Short-term U.S. Treasury yields declined on Friday with the 2-year at 4.094%as oil prices fell following increased crude shipments through the Strait of Hormuz, which reached their highest level since the start of the U.S.-Israeli war against Iran. But it is still off, then on again and the question of transit fees remains unresolved. Secretary of State Marco Rubio, wrapping up a Gulf tour that included a meeting with the Gulf Cooperation Council in Bahrain, again rejected any system of charges, saying international waterways "do not belong to any nation state" and warning that allowing fees would spread "throughout the world like a contagion." But market participants this week turned their attention squarely back to the high-flying artificial intelligence trade and as a result Wall Street ended slightly lower on Friday, driving home a mostly steep decline for the week on the back of sliding technology stocks. A key index of semiconductor stocks fell 5.3 per cent, as investors continued to pare holdings in some of the year’s highest-flying shares as concerns about the AI trade persist. Still, the index has rallied 84 per cent so far this year. While five of the seven megacaps rose; Alphabet and Nvidia closed down. The S&P 500 slipped 0.05 per cent to 7337. The Dow Industrials also slipped 0.09 per cent. The Nasdaq Composite edged down 0.2 per cent as losses among industrials and information technology stocks drove the S&P 500 modestly lower to end New York’s trading week, even as health care led six of the benchmark’s 11 industry sectors higher. For the week, the S&P was down 2.2% and the Nasdaq an even worse 4.6%. The Dow bucked the trend and eked out a gain of 0.6%. The S&P 500 Technology sector posted a weekly decline of more than 5%. The big theme over the last few days was the state of the memory market, amid major announcements and media reports centered on South Korean giants Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix, and blowout quarterly results from the world’s third-largest memory chipmaker, Micron Technology. http://www.martinnorth.com/ Details of our one to one service are here: https://digitalfinanceanalytics.com/blog/dfa-one-to-one/ Go to the Walk The World Universe at https://walktheworld.com.au/ Find more at https://digitalfinanceanalytics.com/blog/ where you can subscribe to our research alerts Please consider supporting our work via Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/DigitalFinanceAnalytics The full detailed set of post code data is available as a subscription service. Or make a one-off contribution to help cover our costs via PayPal at: https://www.paypal.me/MartinDFA We also can receive bitcoins at: 13zBL1oRib9VJu8Uc9zUGNhxKDBBgUpDN1 Please share this post to help to spread the word about the state of things.... Caveat Emptor! Note: this is NOT financial or property advice!! 🚨BEWARE OF SCAMMERS🚨 As there are accounts impersonating Walk The World in the comments on YouTube, note that our comments will have a distinguishable verified symbol. And remember that we will never message you asking you to give us money or talk to us on other platforms such as WhatsApp or Telegram