Weekly Market Update 27 - 06 - 2022 - Stocks Bounce Back, The West vs Russia Continues!

Welcome to your Weekly Market Update 

Despite a strong bounce in U.S. equities over the last week, we are still set to wrap up the worst first half of the year for stocks in decades.  

Posting a positive week for the first time since May, we saw the three major indices climb 5.4% on The Dow, 6.5% on The S&P 500 and 7.5% on The Nasdaq. We could see stocks continue to push higher this week also, as investors assess whether we have seen the bottom of the market.  

Chart of Nasdaq 100.

Inflation remains a hot topic once again, with the week just gone we saw new peaks in the U.K. and Canada reported, levels not seen before for 40+ years. This of course puts on even more pressure onto the central banks to continue to increase interest rates until we see inflation start to tail off.  

This of course hasn’t been helped with continued sanctions by the E.U. and the West on Russia for the continued war on Ukraine.  

The sanctions increased the price of oil along with the rates of inflation globally, all whilst the E.U. continued to purchase both oil and gas from Russia, but now at much higher prices.  

Since the start of the war, Russia has received over $98 billion from the world for its oil and gas, with the E.U. accounting for over 50% of this ($60 billion) as they are hostage to their energy needs.  

At the same time, Russia’s central bank now has to actively try to devalue their currency as the Russian Ruble flies to 7-year highs against the USD.  

They are also on the brink of a historic debt default on interest payments totaling $100 million, but it is uncertain the likely impact this will have in this labyrinth of ‘The West vs. Russia’.  

The one thing we can be certain of is continued higher energy prices, inflation to persist and volatile markets across asset classes.  

Until the next week’s Market Updates…Have a great trading week! 

If you have any questions, you can email us at [email protected]