20 August, 2017
Spanish police said they had killed four attackers in a shootout south of the city overnight. The dollar dropped almost 1% against the yen, falling to 108.58 yen, its lowest since late April. The dollar finished the week up nominally against the yen, gaining 0.1%.
Japan's Nikkei slid 1.2 per cent on global jitters and a stronger yen, and looked set to lose 1.4 per cent for the week. "We can now see a reversal in fortunes and sentiment deteriorating", Chris Weston, chief market strategist at IG in Melbourne, wrote in a note.
Trump on Thursday again decried the removal of pro-slavery Civil War Confederacy monuments, which have fueled USA racial tensions.
After Trump blamed counter-protesters as much as the white nationalists for clashes that left one woman dead, an exodus of business executives from his advisory councils on Wednesday fueled speculation other officials, such as Cohn, would leave.
A statement from the White House that Cohn intends to remain in his position calmed markets only briefly before selling resumed.
The U.S. dollar index had pared losses after the Bannon news but then fell well off its session highs in the afternoon.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average .DJI fell 76.22 points, or 0.35 percent, to 21,674.51, the S&P 500 .SPX lost 4.46 points, or 0.18 percent, to 2,425.55 and the Nasdaq Composite .IXIC dropped 5.39 points, or 0.09 percent, to 6,216.53.
The dollar index a measure of the United States currency against a basket of six trade-weighted major rivals rebounded to end at 93.42 against 93.10 last week.
In the Eurozone, news from the European Central Bank's latest meeting minutes resulted in a Euro sell off when it became clear that the governing council is concerned about repricing the Euro and a possible overshoot.
A recent bounce in the euro, which is making the bloc's exports less attractive and imports cheaper, has been singled out by investors as the biggest threat to the ECB's efforts to revive inflation in the euro zone. The USD/CHF is also down about 0.08% and trading at 0.9618 Swiss Francs, off the session low of 0.96075 Swiss Francs.
Oil prices rose on Thursday as investors focused on US oil stockpile declines after an industry report suggested inventories at the Cushing, Oklahoma hub were declining.
USA crude rose 3.38 percent to $48.68 per barrel and Brent was last at $52.84, up 3.55 percent on the day.
With a decline of more than 2 percent for the last two weeks, the S&P marked its weakest two-week period since before Trump was elected on November 8.
USA crude fell 0.3 percent to $46.95 on Friday, surrendering some of Thursday's 0.7 percent gain, heading for a 3.8 percent weekly loss.
Spot gold was steady today at US$1,286.85 an ounce, holding most of yesterday's 0.4 per cent gain.
The pan-European FTSEurofirst 300 index .FTEU3 lost 0.73 percent hurt by the news from Barcelona and MSCI's gauge of stocks across the globe .MIWD00000PUS shed 0.31 percent.
