Global markets
The all-important Fed meeting came and went last week with global markets largely taking the more hawkish than expected tilt in their stride. Global equities retreated modestly, but bond yields actually fell over the week – with the latter perhaps still more concerned with the rapidly spreading Omicron variant.

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Global markets
The theme of the past week is ‘old news’, in the sense that global equities managed to lift in the face of rising Omicron cases and the highest U.S. inflation numbers since 1982. But as the saying goes, markets are forward-looking: equities saw fit to take relief from the fact that global Omicron deaths and hospitalisations still seem contained and,

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Global markets
Global equities were coasting along for much of last week before being hit on Friday by concerns over a new Covid variant – Omicron. While new COVID variants emerge regularly in a Darwinian fight for survival, what jolted markets was the World Health Organisation’s (WHO) decision to label it yet another ‘variant of concern’

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Global markets
It was a mixed week for global equities with ongoing inflation and interest rate concerns countered somewhat by rising COVID cases in Europe and the United States. Wall Street was pleased to see a strong October U.S. retail sales report, but less happy with hawkish comments by a few Fed members suggesting bond tapering should be accelerated.

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Global markets
Global equities buckled last week following a higher than expected U.S. consumer inflation report, which also pushed up bond yields and the $US. The U.S. market is now convinced (according to futures pricing) that the Fed will have to raise rates by August next year – or almost immediately after it concludes the tapering in bond purchases by mid-2022.

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S&P500 (Daily) (double click for larger view)

Source:TradingView.com
Global markets*
Global equities continued their impressive rebound over the past week, helped by dovish news from several central banks which in turn lowered bond yields. The S&P 500 rose 2% over the week, with U.S. 10-year bond yields dropping 10 basis points to 1.45%.

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Global markets
Generally solid earnings results continued to support Wall Street over the past week, as did an easing back in long-term bond yields. Hopes that President Biden’s infrastructure package might get over remaining Congressional hurdles was also a positive.
U.S. economic data was somewhat mixed, with a softer than expected 2% annualised gain in Q3 GDP (market 2.7%),

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Global markets
Global equities continued their impressive rebound last week, with strength in the Q3 U.S. corporate earnings season offsetting concerns with regard to supply chain bottlenecks, inflation and interest rates. According to FactSet, an above-average 84% of the 23% of  U.S. S&P 500 companies that have reported so far beat expectations.

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Global markets
Global equities enjoyed a second successive week of gains, reflecting a good start to the Q3 U.S. earnings reporting season and a U.S. consumer price index report that was at least not a lot worse than feared. The S&P 500 bounced 1.8%, with the NASDAQ-100 up 2.2%, helped also by a small decline in U.S.

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Note: Data in tables and charts refer to Friday closing prices (not overnight moves)
Global markets
A month or so ago the main worry on global markets was that there didn’t seem much to worry about (i.e. investors were complacent). We’ve now shifted to markets having a litany of things to worry about –

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