■Uncertainty regarding the outcome of Thursday’s U.K. referendum continues to rattle markets
â– Sovereign bond yields visit new lows as investors flock to safer havens
â– British M.P. Jo Cox assassination supports speculation for a Bremain, rather than a Brexit
■Fed’s dovish rate announcement weighs on Dollar
â– Commodities prove a resilient haven to Brexit turbulence
Speculating over the outcome of Thursday’s due U.K. referendum and possible Brexit continued to rule markets this week. On a broadly perspective, the countdown didn’t aid equity with a sizable 1.5% weekly loss recorded at the FTSE 100 and a 2.1% weekly decline at the DAX. In the U.S., a 1.2% weekly loss was also recorded at the S&P 500, as the negative European sentiment was augmented by declines in local high-tech. Alphabet (GOOGL), namely, lost 3.8% for the week and Apple’s (AAPL) stock decreased 3.5%.
Voicing macro concerns, investors rushed to park their capital in sovereign bonds. Bond yields, which move inversely to their price, saw impressive declines. The U.S. 10 year sovereign bond, namely, dipped to as low as 1.52% on Thursday, an abyss unseen since 2012. Longer tenors of the German yield curve have also dipped into negative territory, with the German 10 year visiting -4bp on Thursday.
FX markets continued to provide some of the most exciting rigs to trade the referendum. The Pound did weaken considerably at the start of the week, with GBP/USD hitting a low of 1.4013 on Thursday’s session. The tragic assassination of British M.P. Jo Cox, however, has led to increasing speculation towards a Bremain, securing close to a 2.7% rally for the currency pair in the course of less than a day. The Bank of Japan’s refusal to introduce new monetary measures on Thursday’s announcement also led to the strengthening of the JPY – USD/JPY declined 1.6% during the day, hitting a two-year low at 103.55. Further weighing on the Dollar was the Fed’s Wednesday rate announcement being a fairly dovish one, with six of the FOMC’s 17 members expecting just one rate hike in 2016.
