Stocks struggled for direction in choppy trading overnight after a week of market turbulence sparked by AI (artificial intelligence) jitters, with a divided US Federal Reserve standing pat on rates and leaving bond markets uncertain about the next move.<\/p>\n
Investors searching for clarity from a newly led Fed were disappointed on Wednesday, warning that the central bank\u2019s mixed messages on the outlook for interest rates could unsettle stocks and bonds and increase the risk of market volatility.<\/p>\n
The Fed \u200ckept interest rates unchanged in a target range of 3.5 per cent to 3.75 per cent. <\/p>\n
The vote drew three dissents from the 12-member panel, leading analysts to characterise the decision as a \u201chawkish hold\u201d that leaves the door open to future rate hikes.<\/p>\n
US president Donald Trump\u2019s new \u200bFed chair Kevin Warsh vowed to contain inflation, which remains above target, but did not indicate the steps the central bank might take, noting \u2060that bond yields had risen notably since the Fed\u2019s last policy meeting, reflecting market \u200cexpectations \u200cof \u200bhigher interest rates.<\/p>\n
\u201cTalking hawkish but not acting \u200bso reduces the Fed\u2019s credibility,\u201d said Wall Street veteran Ed Yardeni. \u201cWe conclude that the Fed \u2060has to raise short-term rates to \u2060lower long-term rates.\u201d<\/p>\n
That confusion left yields on 30-year U.S. bonds at 5.2039 per cent, having \u200chit their highest since June 2007 at 5.2273 per cent late in New York trading.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, Asian stocks extended their losses overnight Wednesday and into Thursday morning. <\/p>\n
Asian chipmakers have dominated headlines this week as \u200binvestors raised concerns over massive artificial intelligence spending and China potentially emerging as a competitive threat. <\/p>\n
The tech-heavy indexes in Seoul and Taipei are set \u2060to finish July down 33.2 per cent and 12.3 per cent, respectively, with the KOSPI eyeing its weakest month on record.<\/p>\n
The \u200bKOSPI was down 1 per cent in choppy trading this morning, on track for a 15 per cent weekly slump, a \u200bselloff that prompted Finance Minister Koo Yun-cheol to apologise for the rollout of single-stock leveraged ETFs and led authorities to unveil market-stabilisation measures.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Stocks struggled for direction in choppy trading overnight after a week of market turbulence sparked by AI (artificial…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":575208,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[220,218,219,1961,61,60,66147,80],"class_list":["post-575207","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-artificial-intelligence","tag-ai","tag-artificial-intelligence","tag-artificialintelligence","tag-federal-reserve","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-kevin-warsh","tag-technology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/575207","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=575207"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/575207\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/575208"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=575207"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=575207"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=575207"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}