Stocks are Plunging as Traders Pile into Havens After a Drone Strike Slashed Saudi Oil Output

September 16th, 2019

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Category: Miscellaneous

(Markets Insider) – European equities and US futures plunged on Monday after a drone attack on a Saudi Arabian oil facility slashed global output by nearly 6%. Brent crude spiked as much as 20% — its biggest intraday move on record, according to Bloomberg — spurring traders to drop stocks in favor of gold and other haven assets.

“The implications of these attacks are far-reaching and lasting, going well beyond the immediate disruption to albeit a very large portion of global output,” Neil Wilson, chief market analyst for Markets.com, said in a morning note. “The genie is out of the bottle in terms of risk premium.”

Here’s the market roundup as of 9:33 a.m. in New York:

  • Oil prices have spiked with Brent crude up 10.2% at $66.30, and West Texas Intermediate up 9.3% at $59.90.
  • Gold jumped 0.6% to $1,509 as traders bought more of the haven asset.
  • US stocks opened lower with the Dow Jones Industrial Average down 0.2%, S&P 500 down 0.3%, and Nasdaq down 0.5%.
  • European equities have slumped with Germany’s DAX down 0.5%, Britain’s FTSE 100 down 0.3%, and the Euro Stoxx 50 down 0.6%.
  • Asian indexes were mixed with China’s Shanghai Composite flat, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng down 1%, and Japan’s Nikkei up 1.1%.

Saudi Arabia is racing to restore about a third of the affected production by the end of Monday. The US is prepared to release emergency oil reserves, and President Donald Trump tweeted the nation is “locked and loaded” to retaliate for the attack.

Signs of slowing growth in China also weighed on market sentiment. Industrial output rose 4.4% in August, according to Reuters, falling short of a median estimate of 5.2%.

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