Equities dip after Wall Street retreat - 21.1.2022

The Dollar strengthening has halted currently. The live dollar index data show the ICE US Dollar index, a measure of the dollar’s strength against a basket of six rival currencies, added 0.1% Thursday despite the US Labor Department report above forecast 286 thousand Americans sought unemployment benefits over the last week, up from 231 thousand the previous week.

Both EUR/USD and GBP/USD reversed their climbing yesterday despite Destatis report producer prices inflation in Germany accelerated in December to highest increase ever. Euro is higher against the Dollar currently while Pound is lower still. AUD/USD continued climbing yesterday while USD/JPY’s continued sliding with the yen higher against the Greenback currently and Australian dollar lower.

Futures on three main US stock indexes are mixed currently with US 10-year Treasury note yields down at 1.776%. US stock market continued retreating Thursday as Treasury Secretary Yellen said she was confident the Federal Reserve would take steps needed to bring down inflation over the course of 2022. The three main US stock benchmarks recorded daily losses in the range of 0.9% to 1.3% led by tech stocks.

European stock indexes are mixed currently after closing higher Thursday led by travel and leisure shares. Asian indexes are mostly retreating today led by Australia’s All Ordinaries ASX 200 Index .

Brent is edging higher. Prices ended lower yesterday after the US Energy Information Administration indicating total domestic crude oil inventories rose by 515 thousand barrels last week accompanied by a stock build across refined products. The US oil benchmark West Texas Intermediate (WTI) lost 6 cents but is higher currently. Brent crude lost 6 cents to $88.38 a barrel on Thursday.