Today’s Stock Exchanges, February 21st. Uncertainty on the markets, Wall Street towards a weak restart

Today's Stock Exchanges, February 21st.  Uncertainty on the markets, Wall Street towards a weak restart

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MILAN – Weak futures for Western stock exchanges, with Wall Street returning to activity after President’s Day. Trading in Asia was also characterized by weakness, with investors worried about the possibility that central banks will keep rates higher for longer longer than expected to fight inflation. Against this backdrop, the dollar strengthened. This scenario, which is also affected by geopolitical uncertainty one year after the Russian invasion of Ukraine, risks playing against the equity sector, which has returned from a rocket start in this 2023. Among the data of the day, focus on the PMI indices.

Key points

  • The Japanese PMI is bad, Tokyo closes down

Mixed Asian stock exchanges, bad Hong Kong

The Asian markets proceed in no particular order in the final session. After Tokyo closed slightly down, Hong Kong sees the Hang Seng index lose 1.43%, while Shanghai defends itself with a slight rise of 0.12%. The Shenzhen index, on the other hand, dropped 0.24%.

The Japanese PMI is bad, Tokyo closes down

The Tokyo Stock Exchange closed its session with a loss with the Nikkei falling 0.21% to 27,473 points, while the Topix index lost 0.11% to 1.997 points. The Japanese manufacturing PMI, which dropped to a 30-month low, affected the Japanese stock market, a worrying sign for the world’s third largest economy, which is facing weakening demand and struggling to tame cost pressures. The flash PMI dropped to 47.4 points in February, from 48.9 points the previous month.

Weak futures on Europe and Wall Street. Euro little moved

The main European stock exchanges are heading towards a downturn for the start of the session after yesterday’s difficult session. Futures on the Frankfurt Dax file down 0.10%, those on the London FTSE 100 drop by 0.14% while an initial drop of 0.12% is expected for the EuroStoxx 50.

Slight declines, after yesterday’s holiday closure, also arriving on Wall Street. Futures on the Dow Jones file down 0.09%, those on the S&P 500 drop by 0.11% while for the Nasdaq an initial decline of 0.14% is looming.

The euro opens with little movement both against the dollar (the single currency is traded at 1.0669 dollars, -0.11%) and against the yen (143.45, +0.06%). Dollar/yen at 134.43 (+0.17%).

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