Top 5 things that moved markets this past week
Investing.com – Take a peek at the top 5 things that rocked U.S. markets this week.
Bitcoin bulls made a late stand
Chinese authorities reportedly ordered all local cryptocurrency exchanges to cease trading, forcing two of the largest China-based cryptocurrency exchanges announced plans to exit the market.
That didn’t deter Bitcoin bulls as they piled into the beleaguered cryptocurrency inducing a more than 10% rebound. The damage had already been done, however, after Bitcoin shed more than $10 billion off its market cap as reports of China’s plan to shutter local exchanges intensified.
Earlier during the week, J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. boss Jamie Dimon sparked a sell-off, warning that bitcoin “is a fraud” and “will eventually blow up”.
Bitcoin rose more than 10% to $3649.8 but was track to post a sharp weekly decline on Friday.
The Bank of England sparked a Sterling rally
GBP/USD hit its highest level since the Brexit vote last year June, piling pressure on the greenback after Bank of England committee member Gertjan Vlieghe said Friday, the “moment is approaching” for a rate increase.
Mr Vlieghe’s hawkish comments came a day after the Bank of England kept rates unchanged but warned that interest rates were likely to rise for the first time in more than a decade in the “coming months” to curb the fast pace of inflation.
Crude oil had best performance in 7 weeks
Crude oil prices settled higher on Friday, rounding off its best week since July amid rising expectations that higher oil demand will reduce excess crude supplies to Opec’s five-year average target.
Opec said production in August fell by 79,000 barrels a day (bpd) to 32.76 million as falling production from Venezuela, Iraq, the UAE and Saudi Arabia offset rising output from Nigeria.
That was followed by the International Energy Agency report forecasting a surge in demand growth in 2017 by 100,000 barrels a day (bpd) to 1.6m bpd, or 1.7%. The bullish outlook on oil demand, lifted expectations that the demand and the supply imbalance in oil markets would continue to narrow in the coming months.
U.S. stocks hit record highs
The Dow had its best week since December as investors piled into equities amid renewed hopes of tax-reform after President Donald Trump urged lawmakers to “move fast” on tax reform earlier the week.
That followed comments from Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin who said the Trump administration is considering backdating tax reform to the start of the year to boost the American economy.
Backdating "is still something we are considering and it would be a big boon for the economy," he said at the Delivering Alpha conference on Tuesday.
Gold snapped a three-week winning streak
Gold snapped a three-week winning on streak on Friday, pressured by renewed rate hike expectations after data showed U.S. inflation hit a seven-month while a spike in geopolitical uncertainty failed to garner demand for the precious metal.
North Korea launched a missile that flew over Japan and landed in the Pacific Ocean, raising geopolitical uncertainty while increasing safe haven demand. The uptick in safe haven demand was short lived, however, as investors downplayed the potential fallout from North Korea’s latest act of aggression.
The bullish inflation data came ahead of the Federal Reserve Open Market Committee (FOMC) two-day meeting slated for Sept 19-20, at which members are expected to stand pat on interest rate policy.
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