Recession Fears🤔
US retail sales are down
- As consumers cut down on discretionary spending in November, retail sales in the US fell sharply, raising concerns among investors about a potential recession in the largest economy in the world. Despite the crucial Christmas shopping season beginning, November retail sales were down 0.6% from October, which is the largest decrease in 2022.
- As a result, consumers cut back on discretionary spending on things like holiday shopping, home improvement, and vehicles. Additionally, manufacturing output fell for the first time since June.
Fears of a recession cause Wall Street to drop
- Yesterday, Wall Street completely retreated as investor morale was dampened by concerns about the recession and further pressure to raise interest rates. Shares fell during the session due to weak retail sales data and Fed rate hike pressure from the previous day.
- A few Wall Street analysts believe that a "soft landing," or a modest recession, is still feasible despite the bleak mainstream prognosis. But, all situation is ambiguous, and as a result, future market volatility may increase.
Source: Photo by Chris Li on Unsplash
Palladium falls
- Palladium's price dropped yesterday as the US imposed new penalties on influential Russian businesspeople, including Vladimir Potanin, the company's largest shareholder and a key producer of nickel and palladium.
- The price of the crucial industrial metal has fallen recently due to concerns about demand and a worsening prognosis for the world economy.
Other news:
- Bank of England pauses rate increases: The bank rate was raised by 0.5% yesterday, reaching 3.5%, the highest level in 14 years. The increase was less than the last hike of 0.75% because the bank decided to be more cautious, given that UK inflation is starting to slow down.
- Lower oil prices: As the markets assessed the consequences of central banks raising interest rates, oil prices fell this morning. Despite this, markets were anticipating their biggest weekly gains in 10 weeks due to concerns over supply interruption and hope for a rebound in Chinese demand.
- However, Weekly Jobless Claims actually performed better than anticipated, falling -20,000 to 211,000 vs. the average estimate of 230K. The more outstanding performance, however, only highlighted the challenges the Fed will face in coping with such a tight labor market as it monitors wage growth inflation.
- Elon Musk has terminated the Twitter accounts of several prominent US journalists, claiming they violated a recently implemented location-sharing policy.
- The bankruptcy of FTX and the fraud allegations brought against its creator Sam Bankman-Fried, according to Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao, are to blame for the recent flood of withdrawals that hit the largest cryptocurrency exchange in the world.
Source: FT.com
In October, stocks increased. November, too. December still has a half-month left. Additionally, December usually ranks among the strongest months of the greatest quarter.