Session of losses for European stock markets, with the Ibex-35 dropping more than 1% below 9,000 points ahead of the European Central Bank (ECB) meeting. The selective has also been contaminated by the tension following Wednesday’s Fed meeting and especially by the risk of the fall of WestPac, another US regional bank that has been in the spotlight for days. Financials are again among the hardest hit stocks, with losses of 2.8% for Unicaja and more than 2% for Sabadell, CaixaBank and BBVA. Santander also lost 1.8% and Bankinter 0.9%. Investors today are also citing the US decision to raise benchmark interest rates by 25 basis points to a range of 5%-5.25%. Most importantly, however, the agency left open the possibility of interrupting the bullish cycle in June. However, Jerome Powell’s subsequent speech left something lost for the market. On the one hand, he recognized that possibility. But he qualified that rates can also be uploaded if required by the data becoming known “meeting by meeting”. And what investors liked least: He insisted that the Fed has no plans to cut them before the end of the year, as the market has been anticipating since the banking crisis erupted in the country. The market was also surprised that Powell eased tensions on the banking sector, despite the recent fall of First Republic Bank and its new focus on WestPac, another victim of investors. The entity collapses 45% before the open and extends its collapse to more than 70% in just six sessions in which it has gone from 11.08 to 3.5 euros (if the collapse is confirmed at the open). The tension is so great that the entity has been forced to release a statement assuring it “has not experienced any unusual deposit flows following the sale of First Republic Bank and other news.” “Our liquidity remains solid and outperforms our uninsured deposits,” he emphasises. But rumors of a possible asset sale or capital raise have investors wary given the possibility of the collapse of another regional bank, this time based in Beverly Hills and with 70 branches across the US and $44 billion in assets. .
Source: La Verdad
I’m Ben Stock, a journalist and author at Today Times Live. I specialize in economic news and have been working in the news industry for over five years. My experience spans from local journalism to international business reporting. In my career I’ve had the opportunity to interview some of the world’s leading economists and financial experts, giving me an insight into global trends that is unique among journalists.
