Weekly Market Updates [Sunday, 5 May 2024]
Blog post description.
Jason William Budiono
5/5/20241 min read
Fixed Income:
US Treasury yield fell between 100 to 150 bps across the curve this week as US hot market numbers moderated slightly. US unemployment rate rose slightly from 3.8% to 3.9%, while non-farm payrolls of 175K was below the market expectations of 243K. The number of rate cuts that the market priced in for this year rose slightly from 1.34 to 1.72 (based on 30-day Fed Funds Futures for Dec 2024).
Equities:
FX:
This week, the Japanese Yen experienced significant fluctuations:
On Monday, the Yen touched 160.03 against the greenback, the first time since 1990. This was a fresh 34-year low.
The Yen then strengthened to 156 levels later that day amid speculation about an intervention by Japanese authorities.
On Wednesday, the currency strengthened by more than 2% to trade near 153 against the dollar. This is also likely to have been caused by an intervention.
By Friday, the Yen was scaling higher for the third straight day and stood tall near a three-week high.
The size of the first suspected intervention could have been between 5 trillion and 6 trillion yen ($32.7 billion to $39.2 billion), based on Bank of Japan data.