Daily Markets: Bull Market May Have Met Its Bear
The seemingly unstoppable upward movement of equity markets may have met its match last night. Yesterday, the first day of trading in 2020, saw the Nasdaq 100 rise 1.6%, the Nasdaq Composite gain 1.3%, the Dow 1.2%, and the S&P 500 0.8% driven in large part by the news that China’s central bank cut reserve requirements, unleashing a material level of liquidity.
This morning things have changed. US equity futures are in the red on the news that General Qassim Soleimani, Iran’s top commander who led a special forces unit of Iran’s elite Revolutionary Guards and has been a key figure in Middle East politics, was killed by a US drone strike in Baghdad. As we warned in yesterday’s piece, this comes after a New Year’s Eve attack by Iran-backed militias on the US Embassy in Baghdad. The Defense Department’s statement, issued last night at 10 pm ET, can be read here, and a response on Twitter from Iran’s Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif is here.
This could get very ugly.
