OPEC inaction halts Europe rally; dollar firms
Oil prices extended their recent slide on Friday, sending related shares and currencies lower, after OPEC decided to refrain from cutting output despite a supply glut.
Brent crude LCOc1 touched a low of $71.12 a barrel after settling at a four-year closing low on Thursday, when Saudi Arabia blocked calls from poorer members of the cartel to cut production to stem a slide in global prices.
Oil dominated Asian trade, and was set to remain in focus as U.S. markets reopened after the Thanksgiving holiday.
Brent crude came off its lows to trade 0.8 percent lower at $72.00, and was poised to shed more than 16 percent for November. U.S. crude CLc1 was last down 6.7 percent at $68.78.
European oil & gas stocks .SXEP dropped 4.7 percent, crimping the pan-European FTSEurofirst 300 .FTEU3, which fell 0.5 percent to 1,386.17 and looked set to snap a five-day winning streak.
The top four risers on the index were airlines, which are among the biggest beneficiaries of a drop in oil prices.
The safe-haven dollar firmed against commodity-related stocks and also the euro EUR= and the yen JPY=. Although a lower oil price helps to support economic growth, it undermines attempts in Japan and the euro zone to avoid deflation.
“Whatever positive connotations lower energy might have for global growth, the extent and pace of the decline in oil seems the more worrying factor for the moment,” said Michael Turner, a strategist with RBC Capital Markets.
Euro zone sovereign bond yields were pinned at record lows on Friday as the plunge in oil prices weighed on inflation expectations ahead of bloc-wide data.
Regional inflation data was due at 1000 GMT, with soft readings from Germany and Spain suggesting the European Central Bank may come under more pressure to ramp up monetary stimulus.
German 10-year yields DE10YT=TWEB, the benchmark for euro zone borrowing, were down a fraction at just under 0.70 percent, while French peers FR10YT=TWEB were 1 bp down at 0.99 percent.
Lower-rated bonds from Italy and Spain, which trade at a large premium to Bunds and offer the greatest amount of potential for tightening if the ECB launches a full-blown quantitative easing (QE) programme, saw bigger moves. <GVD/EUR>
“The outcome of the OPEC meeting and the slump in oil prices that followed bring huge uncertainties,” said Naeem Aslam, Chief Market Analyst at Avatrade, in Dublin.
“It’s bad news for (ECB chief Mario) Draghi because it will prevent any rebound in inflation.”
Expectations are that the ECB may follow Japan in buying government debt to try to vanquish deflation. On Friday, Japanese two-year government bonds traded at a negative yield JP2YTN=JBTC for the first time in history, as the Bank of Japan’s massive bond buying crushed short-term debt yields.
The dollar rose about 0.5 percent against the yen to 118.22 yen JPY=, while the euro drifted down about 0.2 percent to $1.2438 EUR=.
But the greenback made dramatic moves against the currencies of oil-rich countries, rallying to as much as 6.9963 Norwegian crowns NOK=, a high not seen in over five years. It was last at 6.9469.
The U.S. dollar spiked to a one-week high against its Canadian counterpart at C$1.1383 CAD=D4. Against a basket of six major currencies, the dollar rose 0.7 percent .DXY.
Spot gold XAU= extended losses into a third session on expectations that plunging oil prices could sap inflationary pressure and curb the metal’s appeal as a hedge. Gold was down 0.6 percent at $1,184.00 an ounce, over 1 percent lower on the week and ready to snap a three-week rally.
Bucking the international trend, Chinese stocks rallied.
The Shanghai Composite Index .SSEC was headed for its biggest monthly gain in nearly two years after last week’s surprise rate cut from Beijing, in a month that also marked the launch of the Shanghai-Hong Kong stock connect scheme.
Source: Reuters – OPEC inaction halts Europe rally; dollar firms
