The malaise that had been hovering over the stock exchanges for a few sessions reached its peak today, with a heavy decline on all markets. After the Asian ones, the European markets also close in the red, while Wall Street has started out of tune and is currently continuing in largely negative territory.
Business Square the budget for the session is very heavy: -3,33%. The Ftse Mib retreats to March levels at 23.965 points, with almost all blue chips down, with the exception of health stocks, Diasorin (+ 1,81%) and Amplifon (+0,47%). The collapse of is felt negatively Enel, -5,07%, the big plus of the list, on the ex-dividend date. Bad banks, with Bper (-5,08%) stopped in volatility during the session. And he gets up spread between the ten-year Italian and German: 113 basis points (+3,64%), despite the Italian bond yield falling to +0,7%, because the Bund does much better and closes at -0,43%. Risk aversion favors North American government bonds, which record rising prices and falling yields.
After the lavish equity gains of recent months, investors are cashing in, intimidated by the resurgence of the pandemic globally, above all due to the Delta variant and the consequent risk that new closures will curb the recovery. The US-China tensions and the thud in oil following the agreement within OPEC+ are also being felt. On the one hand, therefore, there are fears that growth is already at the end of the line, on the other, the cartel has decided to increase production in the perspective of growing demand due to the restart.
In the background there is still the fear that inflation will force the hand of the central banks, despite the reassurances on the US front that came last week from Fed number one Jerome Powell. This week we look at the ECB meeting, Thursday 22, after the recent strategic update by Eurotower.
Against this backdrop, all of Europe falls back: Frankfurt -2,69%; Paris -2,54%; Amsterdam -2,1%; Madrid -2,4%. Also London -2,32%, lives with a certain sadness the day of full reopening, with the mockery of Boris Johnson in quarantine and the threshold of 50 thousand daily infections now one step away.
Among the sectors most affected by sales are travel and tourism, which were most likely to benefit from a return to normality thanks to vaccines. Other economic-sensitive sectors such as mining, autos and components, and banking also fared amid rising coronavirus cases fueling prospects for a slower recovery.
On the currency market the euro-dollar it is little moved, in the 1,18% area.
Among the commodities the price of the collapses Petroleum. The September 2021 Brent future loses about 6% and trades just above 69 dollars a barrel; same-maturity Texan crude fell by almost 7%, at around 66,70 dollars a barrel. Weighing is the official news that OPEC+ has overcome internal divisions to reopen the taps and bring down prices. Yesterday, the ministers of the cartel countries plus their allies reached an agreement to increase the production of crude oil starting from August, in order to cool down the prices which this month have touched the highs of more than two years and reached an agreement for new production quotas starting from 2022. Last year OPEC+ had cut production by a record 10 million barrels per day, in the context of a vertical collapse in demand as the pandemic evolved, leading to a collapse in prices, with US crude futures entering negative territory.
Gradually OPEC+ producers have eased restrictions, which now hover around 5,8 million bpd.
THEgold it does not hold the levee, but limits the losses to a fractional decline: spot gold yields 0,35, 1806 dollars an ounce.
In Piazza Affari, the account for the wounded starts from the banks with Bper -5,07% and Understanding -4,23%. The Agnelli safe suffers Exor -4,75%, with the auto sector in reverse. Oil stocks are falling, first of all Saipem -4,73%.
Male Telecom -4,33%, which lowered the estimates for 2021 and raised those for 2022, after the agreement with Dazn for the distribution of the Serie A championship. The shareholder Vivendi shed 1,54% in Paris after billionaire investor Bill Ackmann decides to buy up to 10% of Vivendi subsidiary Universal Music Group using his own major hedge fund instead of a SPAC.
Sales also hit the luxury sector, despite the day full of news: from the acquisition of the majority stake in Etro by L Catterton Europe, the fund owned by the Arnault family, up to the listing announcement of Zegna in New York through the merger with Spac promoted by Sergio Ermotti and Andrea Bonomi. Moncler retreats 1,2%, Ferragamo by 2,89% e cucinelli 1,81%.
