A very mixed start to the trading week here in Asia following the reversal in risk sentiment on Friday night on Wall Street, but its been overshadowing by the trading halt in Evergrande shares on speculation of a takoever and the absence of mainland Chinese risk trading due to a long holiday. Caution is the catchword, with US futures flat while the USD is largely unchanged against most of the risk currencies with gold also unchanged at the $1760USD per ounce level. Meanwhile Bitcoin has been unable to advance on its Friday night epic surge, still hovering just below the $48K level which represents the previous weekly high:
Mainland Chinese markets are still closed for a holiday while the Hang Seng Index is responding to the trading halt in Evergrande with a 2.2% loss down to just over the 24000 point level while Japanese markets were also in sell mode with the Nikkei 225 closing 1.1% lower to 28447 points. The USDJPY pair is very flat, hovering just above the 111 handle after making a new weekly low previously, with momentum still deeply negative:
Australian stocks have re-engaged to the upside, with the ASX200 lifting almost 1.3% to start the week with a bang at 7278 points while the Australian dollar is slowly eking out a small lift after the weekend gap, now sitting at the 72.70 level but well below last week’s high:
Eurostoxx and S&P futures were down nearly 0.4% before recovering to a flat level going into the London open, with the four hourly chart of the S&P500 showing a rebuff of overhead ATR resistance despite Friday night’s rally, with momentum still negative:
The economic calendar is very quiet with US factory orders the only event of note.
Oh, and curse daylight savings, or the lack of it here in Queensland!