{"id":162318,"date":"2019-12-23T07:20:12","date_gmt":"2019-12-23T12:20:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.countingpips.com\/?p=162318"},"modified":"2019-12-23T06:20:34","modified_gmt":"2019-12-23T11:20:34","slug":"stock-markets-enter-holiday-mood-after-massive-gains-for-the-year","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex\/2019\/12\/stock-markets-enter-holiday-mood-after-massive-gains-for-the-year\/","title":{"rendered":"Stock markets enter holiday mood after massive gains for the year"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"inves-1101334305\" class=\"inves-below-title-posts inves-entity-placement\"><div id =\"posts_date_custom\"><div align=\"left\">December 23, 2019<\/div><hr style=\"border: none; border-bottom: 3px solid black;\">\r\n<\/div><\/div><p><strong>By Hussein Sayed, Chief Market Strategist (Gulf &amp; MENA), <a href=\"http:\/\/countingpips.com\/contributors\/contributor-profile-forextime\/\">ForexTime<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<div class=\"article-body\">\n<div class=\"field-body\">\n<div class=\"field-items\">\n<div class=\"field-item even\">\n<ul>\n<li><em>Asian equities mixed as US indices ended last week on record highs \u00a0<\/em><\/li>\n<li><em>China announced it will lower tariffs on 850 products<\/em><\/li>\n<li><em>Currency markets trading in tight ranges<\/em><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Asian equities traded mixed on Monday, holding near their 2019 highs as volumes dropped with traders and investors preparing to celebrate the holiday break.<\/p>\n<p>Optimism over trade and improving economic activity sent US stocks to new record highs on Friday. The S&amp;P 500 rose 0.5%, while the Dow Jones Industrial Average and Nasdaq Composite advanced 0.3% and 0.4%, respectively.<\/p>\n<p>President Trumps\u2019 tweet on Friday that he had \u201ca very good talk\u201d with China\u2019s President Xi concerning the trade deal contributed to the rally. along with better than anticipated consumer spending data, which showed that the main engine of the US economy remains in a healthy state.<\/p>\n<p>The 2-year\/10-year US Treasury yield curve has steepened the most since November 2018, indicating that investors are much more optimistic than they were several months ago.<\/p>\n<p>The positive news continued to flow today with China\u2019s finance ministry announcing that it will lower tariffs on more than 850 products, starting on January 1.<\/p>\n<p>Historically, equities in the US climb in the final five trading days of the year in addition to the first two trading days of the new year, in what is termed a \u201cSanta Rally\u201d.\u00a0 Whether Santa will be generous enough this year remains to be seen. However, investors have had a phenomenal 2019 so far with the S&amp;P 500 gaining 28.5% in what will be one of the best years in decades.<\/p>\n<p>In currency markets, the Dollar retreated slightly against its major peers, but currencies overall are trading in very tight ranges. Nevertheless, traders need to be aware that low liquidity doesn\u2019t prevent markets from shocks. For example, on January 3 this year, USDJPY plummeted almost 400 pips after Apple slashed its first-quarter guidance. When liquidity is thin, shock news can see highly volatile market moves.<\/p>\n<p>This week, the data flow will slow, with only US personal consumption expenditure due on Friday expected to cause some volatility, if we get any surprises in the reading.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p><em><strong>Disclaimer: <\/strong>The content in this article comprises personal opinions and should not be construed as containing personal and\/or other investment advice and\/or an offer of and\/or solicitation for any transactions in financial instruments and\/or a guarantee and\/or prediction of future performance. ForexTime (FXTM), its affiliates, agents, directors, officers or employees do not guarantee the accuracy, validity, timeliness or completeness, of any information or data made available and assume no liability as to any loss arising from any investment based on the same.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<hr \/>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-54242 alignleft\" src=\"https:\/\/www.countingpips.com\/articles-analysis\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/07\/Forex-Time-Logo.png\" alt=\"Forex-Time-Logo\" width=\"262\" height=\"90\" \/><strong>Article by <span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.countingpips.com\/contributors\/contributor-profile-forextime\/\">ForexTime<\/a><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>ForexTime Ltd (FXTM)<\/strong> is an award winning international online forex broker regulated by CySEC 185\/12 <a href=\"http:\/\/www.forextime.com\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">www.forextime.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Hussein Sayed, Chief Market Strategist (Gulf &amp; MENA), ForexTime Asian equities mixed as US indices ended last week on record highs \u00a0 China announced it will lower tariffs on 850 products Currency markets trading in tight ranges Asian equities traded mixed on Monday, holding near their 2019 highs as volumes dropped with traders and [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-162318","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","no-post-thumbnail"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/162318","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=162318"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/162318\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":162325,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/162318\/revisions\/162325"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=162318"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=162318"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/forex\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=162318"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}