Sentiment is mixed in Asia with heavy selling seen in stock markets of Hong Kong and China, while Nikkei and Singapore Strait Times are recovering. US President Joe Biden announced to impose an immediate ban on imports of Russian Energy. Commercial big names like McDonald's, Coca-Cola, and Pepsi also finally joined to halt businesses in Russia. Gold failed to break through all-time high in first attempt but stays firm at around 2050 for now. WTI crude oil's rally attempt is also capped by 131.82 temporary top, but looks ready to have another take any time. In the currency markets, Euro remains in consolidative mode, digesting recent losses, together with Sterling. Yen, Aussie and Kiwi are the softer ones for today so far. Dollar is attempting to stage a broad based rally, but momentum is not too convincing yet. Technically, USD/CAD's break of 1.2876 resistance suggests resumption of rise from 1.2448, and further rally should be seen to 1.2963. AUD/USD is holding well above 0.7093 near term support despite a deep retreat, and so there is no sign of bearish reversal. USD/CHF and USD/JPY are both bounded in familiar range. Hence, while the greenback remains strong against Euro and Sterling, there is no sign of broad based strength yet, at least until range breakout in USD/CHF and USD/JPY. In Asia, at the time of writing, Nikkei is up 0.74%. Hong Kong HSI is down -1.76%. China Shanghai SSE is down -0.77%. Singapore Strait Times is up 0.84%. Japan 10-year JGB yield is up 0.0148 at 0.170. Overnight, DOW dropped -0.56%. S&P 500 dropped -0.72%. NASDAQ dropped -0.28%. 10-year yield rose 0.121 to 1.872. |
