Wall: ‘Geopolitical’ sell off for second week in a row, close to -2% Dow and Nasdaq

The main indicators of Wall Street closed with negative signs on Friday, expanding their losses in the week and recording the second consecutive falling 5-day period. Today’s session started with some positive trends that were quickly absorbed by the geopolitical tension in Ukraine, with the Dow falling by 233 points and the Nasdaq losing more than 1%.

The Ukrainian crisis has continued to be in the spotlight of investors, with accusations of ceasefire violations continuing today.

The separatist authorities of the Donetsk “democracy” announced on Friday afternoon that A car exploded near a government building in the city of the same name. Authorities in the area have confirmed reports of an explosion in central Donetsk.

The Military Intelligence Service of Ukraine claimed to have information according to which explosives have been placed in infrastructure facilities in Donetsk controlled by pro-Russian guerrillas. The bomber struck shortly after noon in preparation for a “false flag attack” that Ukraine would be blamed for, Kiev said.

The United States called it a “cynical maneuver.” the announcement of the evacuation of areas of eastern Ukraine and the transfer of citizens to Russiaconsidering that it is part of the preparation for a military attack by Moscow.

At the same time, Moscow continues to claim that the military units it had deployed on the border with Ukraine are gradually withdrawing, but for his part, the US Ambassador to the OSCE, Michael Carpenter, said at a meeting of the Organization that they are in the region. up to 190,000 Russian soldiers.

In a speech to the UN Security Council on Thursday, US Secretary of State Blinken again called on Russia to “abandon the path of war”. However, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov agreed to meet with the US Secretary of State next week for new talks on Ukraine, keeping alive the hopes for a diplomatic solution to the crisis.

On the other hand, investors continued to look for signs of how the Fed will move in its forthcoming interest rate hike, with bank official James Bullard reiterating his call for an aggressive stance yesterday before inflation slipped out of control.

Today, the chairman of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, John Williams, said it would be “appropriate” for the Fed to raise interest rates in March and start cutting its $ 9 trillion bond stock “later in the year.”

According to Oanda analyst Edward Moya, “Wall Street is very nervous as it looks to the left and sees growing geopolitical risks with the situation in Ukraine, while then it looks to the right and sees the possibility of an aggressive tightening by the Fed.”

In the meantime, his performance 10-year US government bond fell on Friday by 4.2 basis points to 1.93%. During the week, its performance lost 2.1 basis points in the biggest weekly drop since the corresponding period that ended on January 21.

According to the ICE US Dollar Index, the dollar strengthened on Friday by 0.3%.

Indicators – Statistics

On the dashboard, the industrial index Dow Jones lost 0.68% to 34,079.18 points, the technological Nasdaq fell 1.23% to 13,548.07 points, while the expanded S&P 500 slipped 0.72% to 4,348.87 points.

In week All three indices closed with losses: the Dow fell 1.9%, the S&P 500 slipped 1.6% and the Nasdaq lost 1.8%.

From 30 shares that make up the Dow, 6 closed with a positive sign with Cisco recording the largest gains with an increase of 2.58%. The “Dow” in the Dow was Intel, which sank by 5.32%, after Bank of America repeated the “underperform” rating for the title of technology giant. Significant losses for Boeing at -2.14% and Salesforce which lost 1.5%.

The fall in oil prices put pressure on companies in the field, with Devon Energy (-0.81%), APA (-1.2%) and Schlumberger (-2.19%) falling.

Roku’s share “fell” by -22.29%, after the streaming services company lost estimates for its quarterly earnings and was forced to downgrade its guidance.