Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1463329
Name Current Change %Change Open High Low Prev. Value Close US MARKETS NASDAQ 13,037.49 -344.03 -2.57 13511.75 13533.78 13032.17 13381.52 EUROPEAN MARKETS FTSE 7,251.31 -246.87 -3.29 7498.18 7498.18 7243.44 7498.18 CAC 6,451.79 -328.88 -4.85 6496.25 6617.09 6433.51 6780.67 DAX 13,854.52 -776.84 -5.31 13989.41 14221.71 13826.70 14631.36 ASIAN MARKETS SGX Nifty 16,141.00 -109.00 -0.67 17052.50 17115.00 15500.50 17063.00 Nikkei 225 25,970.82 -478.79 -1.81 26281.35 26357.58 25775.64 26449.61 Straits Times 3,276.06 -116.94 -3.45 3351.24 3363.17 3248.93 3393.00 Hang Seng 22,901.56 -758.72 -3.21 23268.03 23376.37 22786.39 23660.28 Taiwan Weighted 17,594.55 -461.18 -2.55 17939.53 17939.53 17561.07 18055.73 KOSPI 2,648.80 -70.73 -2.60 2689.28 2694.55 2642.63 2719.53 SET Composite 1,662.72 -33.73 -1.99 1683.92 1690.50 1656.62 1696.45 Jakarta Composite 6,817.82 -102.24 -1.48 6912.48 6929.91 6758.86 6920.06 Shanghai Composite 3,429.96 -59.19 -1.70 3474.37 3486.98 3400.21 3489.15 31.3.2022 7 MARKETS International Markets Global Indices Trading Date: 30 March 2022 US stock rally defies economic unease AS a stunning rebound in US stocks charges on, investors are questioning how long the surge can continue in the face of a hawkish Federal Reserve, warnings of recession from the bond market and geopolitical uncertainty. e S&P 500 is up 11 per cent since March 8, its biggest 15-day percentage gain since June 2020, led by many of the high-growth stocks that have been pummeled for much of the year. e benchmark index has cut its year-to-date losses to 2.8 per cent, after it earlier swooned by as much as 12.5 per cent. e move has come despite a broad range of concerns that rocked equities earlier this quarter, among them the war in Ukraine, surging inflation and a sharp rise in Treas- ury yields fueled by tightening monetary policy from the Fed. Stocks shrugged off the latest ominous sign from the bond market on Tuesday. e S&P 500 closed up 1.2 per cent even as the widely tracked US 2-year/10-year Treas- ury yield curve inverted for the first time since September 2019, a phenomenon that has reliably predicted past re- cessions. "It's been mystifying," said Jack Ablin, chief investment of- ficer at Cresset Capital Management. "I think that the bond market is sober and the equity market is quixotic." Investors are pointing to a number of factors that could be driving the bounce in equities. Many have taken heart from Fed Chairman Jerome Pow- ell's assessment of the US economy as strong enough to handle an aggressive pace of rate increases and may be cheering a Fed that now appears to be tackling sky-high inflation head on, analysts said. e S&P 500 has gained over 6 per cent since the Fed's March 16 monetary policy meeting, at which it raised in- terest rates by 25 basis points and penciled in 150 basis points of tightening for the rest of the year. Recent weeks have also seen institutional investors driv- ing up prices as they unwind so-called "short" bets against equities, analysts at Goldman Sachs said in a recent report. At the same time, individual investors have been using the weakness in stocks as an opportunity to buy, the bank said. According to Goldman, $93 billion of capital has flowed into US equity funds since the start of the year, "suggest- ing that households have continued to buy after the record year for US equity inflows in 2021."