A look at the day ahead in European and global markets from Kevin Buckland
The feel-good factor that lifted stocks overnight fizzled on Friday, with neither gains on Wall Street – including another record for the S&P 500 – nor the afterglow of China’s deep cuts in bank reserve requirements able to keep Asian stocks afloat.
Mainland and Hong Kong-listed shares started the day with a slight pop higher but quickly turned lower, while Japan’s Nikkei erased the last of the gains for the week that had taken it to a 34-year peak on Tuesday.
Enthusiasm was drained by events on Wall Street after the close. Intel’s underwhelming revenue forecasts pushed its stock some 10% lower in extended trading, and Asian semiconductor shares toppled like dominoes.
The Nikkei’s four worst-performing shares were all from the chip sector. The Hang Seng’s high-tech subindex slipped 2.65%. That doesn’t bode well for European tech shares.
But there are policy-driven undercurrents affecting Asian shares as well.
There’s been a slow-burn repricing of Japanese risk after the Bank of Japan’s hawkish tilt on Tuesday.
And in China, where policy measures have so far been sporadic and disappointing, it’s been state-backed stock buying and restrictions on short-selling that are supporting markets, as much as any optimism over potential stimulus measures.
A handful of noteworthy earnings reports are due later in the day from Scandinavia, including Sweden’s Volvo, but the European data calendar is light, consisting mainly of consumer sentiment readings from Germany and France.
The weekend invites some profit taking, particularly with the week ahead bringing financial results from the giants of U.S. tech – Apple, Microsoft, Amazon, Alphabet and Meta Platforms – not to mention a Federal Reserve meeting and the always influential monthly jobs report.
But the MSCI world index, up more than 1% for the week so far, still looks likely to manage a third straight weekly gain by the time of Wall Street’s closing bell, despite Asia’s disappointing start.
Key developments that could influence markets on Friday:
-Germany GfK Consumer Sentiment (Feb), France Consumer Confidence (Jan)
-Earnings from Volvo AB, Telia Company AB, Sartorius AG
(By Kevin Buckland; Editing by Edmund Klamann)
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