Weekly Market Summary.

Global equity markets have been buoyed in recent weeks by the prospect of central banks loosening monetary policy.

As we entered the second half of the year, positive momentum in global equity markets continued as the side meeting at the G20 last weekend (29-30 June) between US and Chinese Presidents, Trump and Xi, concluded positively, giving markets a good start to the week.

The main event this week was the two-day G-20 summit in Japan starting today (Friday 28 June 2019) as Donald Trump and his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping have agreed to meet each other on the side-lines tomorrow (Saturday 29 June 2019).

Global equities rose this week on the prospect of looser monetary policy and the hope that US/China trade talks will soon resume.

Global equity markets faced crosscurrents this week, as positive US-Mexico trade developments were overshadowed by uncertainty over US-China trade.

The last two weeks’ equity market moves show perfectly that markets rarely move in a straight line and it is best not to make knee-jerk decisions.

It was an ugly week for global equities as intensifying trade concerns soured sentiment for risk assets.

While US/China trade tensions dominated market sentiment this week after the US said it was considering blacklisting up to five Chinese surveillance firms, there were a couple of positive (albeit) minor developments: the US temporarily eased some of the planned Huawei trade curbs; and China’s ambassador to the US, Cui Tiankai, said that China is ready to continue talks and is committed to forging a new trade deal.

Following a relatively subdued period, global trade was firmly top of the agenda again this week and despite the US and China’s tit-for-tat exchanges, most other equity markets posted positive returns.

The positivity over last Friday’s (3 May 2019) excellent US payrolls report, which showed robust job creation growth with no indication of wage pressure, proved short-lived!