The US President threatened North Korea - 9.8.2017

The Dow index fell for the first time after the 9-day continuous growth

Donald Trump’s announcement escalated political risks

On Tuesday, the US stocks fell after the US President Donald Trump’s announcement concerning the DPRK. He said that the United States would respond with "fire and fury" if North Korea threatened them. Investors considered this to be an increase in political risks. An additional negative was the decline in earnings forecasts for tour operators Priceline and TripAdvisor. Their stocks fell by more than 7%. Film company Walt Disney said that it was going to cease its cooperation with on-line cinema Netflix and launch its own service for watching movies and programs on the Internet. After that, the quotes of both companies fell by about 4%. Yesterday the US dollar index rose due to the increase in the labor market indicator JOLTS Job Openings to the highest since December, 2000. Today, at 14-30 CET the economic data on labor productivity and labor expenses for Q2, 2017 will be released in the US. At 16-00 CET, the information on wholesale inventories for June will be published.

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The forecast of total profit of the companies from the MSCI Euro zone index is lowered

Today the European stock indices have been falling for 3 consecutive days

Today the European stock indices have been falling for 3 consecutive days. Yesterday German foreign trade data turned out to be worse than expected and the weak reports of jewelry company Pandora came out. The forecast for the growth of the companies' net profits from the list of the MSCI Euro zone index for Q2, 2017 was reduced from 22% to 17%. Today, the EU stock prices are falling amid rising political risks. North Korea warned the US that it could attack the US military base on the island of Guam in case of any aggressive action by the United States. In Paris, a car hit a military patrol, which may be another terrorist attack. In addition, several other companies, such as Brenntag, G4S, Symrise, published weak quarterly reports. This contributed to the further decline in the forecast for the profit growth of the MSCI Euro zone companies to 15.7. Today no significant economic information came out in the EU. The euro continues to decline for the second consecutive day amid the strengthening of the US dollar. Due to the growth of political risks, today the Swiss franc demonstrated the highest daily strengthening against the euro for 2 and a half years.

Investors view the yen as a safety asset on the background of political risks

On Wednesday, the Japanese stock index Nikkei fell to the 2.5-month low amid rising political risks concerning North Korea. The exporters’ stocks fell more than other stocks: Toyota Motor (-1.6%), Honda Motor (-1.2%), TDK (-2%), Advantest (-2.6%) and Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group (- 1.1%) and Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group (-1.3%). An additional negative was the decline in orders for industrial equipment in July. The yen strengthened against the US dollar to the 8-week high. Investors view it as a safety asset.

Corn, wheat and soybean prices grew on the backdrop of the weather worsening in the US

On Wednesday, the Brent price has grown and is approaching the level of 53 per barrel before the publication of the next data on oil reserves in the United States for the week. They are expected to reduce by 1.5 mln barrels - already for the 6th consecutive time. Saudi Arabia said it reduced oil shipments in September by 520,000 barrels per day under the current OPEC agreement to limit production. The 15 largest US shale oil companies announced a net loss of $470 mln in Q2, 2017. This was contributed by the low WTI price of $48 per barrel. For normal operation in shale oil fields, the world oil price should be at least $50 per barrel.