Commodity rally on Wall Street
Ukraine conflict is getting on nerves of US investors
02/22/2022, 10:27 p.m
The escalating conflict between Russia and Ukraine continues to make investors very nervous in US stock markets. After the long weekend, the indices started out robust, but then slipped with some back and forth.
The escalation in the Ukraine crisis is fueling fears of shortages in important raw materials such as oil, gas and aluminium. The price of US crude oil rose STI meanwhile by 5.4 percent to a seven and a half year high and sniffed at $ 96 a barrel (159 liters) at the $ 100 mark before dropping drastically and closing at just under $ 92. The US stock market also experienced rollercoaster rides. The broad leading index S&P 500 increased a good 0.6 percent to 4,305 points. The US Standard Value Index Dow Jones lost 0.2 percent while the tech-heavy Nasdaq 1.3 percent increased.
“Fear remains high until we get a clearer picture of what Russian President Vladimir Putin is or isn’t doing,” said Peter Cardillo, chief economist at investment firm Spartan. At the same time, the question arises as to how the US Federal Reserve will react to the situation, as the renewed rise in oil prices is increasing inflationary pressures. Against this background, some investors headed for “safe havens” such as US government bonds. This pushed the yield on the trend-setting ten-year bonds up to 1.846 percent.
The “anti-crisis currency” gold was last seen at $1,899.83 an ounce (31.1 grams) after temporarily rising to a nine-month high of $1,913.89. In the commodities market, expected western sanctions against Russia, a major exporter of oil, gas and metals, played the main role. Parallel to the oil price, the US natural gas future temporarily rose by almost ten percent. “It is unlikely that the West will include Russian oil and gas exports in the sanctions,” said analyst Ricardo Evangelista of brokerage house ActivTrades. “But Moscow could react by limiting energy exports.”
Meanwhile marked the one used for food cans tin a record high of $44,525. The one needed to make steel nickel was at 24,870 dollars per ton as expensive as it was more than ten years ago and that used in aircraft and automobile construction aluminum ended up at $3,280. Analyst Wenyu Yao from ING Bank warned that the Ukraine crisis was only accelerating the price rally, especially for nickel and aluminum. “Even including Russian exports, the markets are undersupplied with both metals.”
At the companies advanced Macy’s into the limelight. The department store chain has exceeded expectations in terms of sales and profits, praised analyst Stephanie Wissink from the investment bank Jefferies. The same applies to the view. The announced $2 billion share buyback program is also positive. Macy’s titles, however, failed to hold their opening gains and fell 5.2 percent. HomeDepot was also unable to translate a surprisingly high sales increase of 8.1 percent into price gains in the quarter. The shares of the hardware store chain fell by almost nine percent. Analyst Michael Baker from the research house DA Davidson complained that the gross margin fell short of expectations and fell for the sixth time in seven quarters.
On the other hand, the papers from were in high demand Digital world, which rose by 9.2 percent. The shell company benefited from the launch of the short message service “Truth Social” launched by former US President Donald Trump. Its operator Trump Media & Technology Group wants to merge with Digital World to the stock exchange. “Truth Social” rose to become the download leader in Apple’s App Store. Stock trader Dennis Dick from the brokerage house Bright Trading warned against exaggerated expectations. “While Trump has an enormous following and they could switch from traditional social media to the new platform, it depends on how good the app is.” The shares of the “Truth Social” rival Twitter fell four percent.