World shares fell on Friday after a week of mixed economic data and fears over the stability of growth and Asian markets put the focus on the U.S. Federal Reserve’s timeline for tapering asset purchases.
U.S. stocks ended sharply lower in a broad sell-off on Friday. All three major U.S. stock indexes lost ground, with the Nasdaq 100 Index weighed down as rising U.S. Treasury yields pressured market-leading growth stocks.
The 10 y briefly touched 1.3855%, its highest level since July 14, while the dollar hit a three-week high.
MSCI’s gauge of stocks across the globe shed 0.71%, while the pan-European STOXX 600 index closed down 0.9% for a third-straight week of losses. So far this month, the STOXX is down about 2%.
MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan rose 0.29%.
Investors hope the Fed’s meeting next week will yield more clarity on its plan to slow down asset purchases, and when it might raise interest rates.
Shares in embattled property developer China Evergrande, which has two trillion yuan ($310 billion) in liabilities and faces an $80 million bond coupon payment next week, dropped 30% this week.
Concerns grew that a potential U.S. corporate tax hike could erode earnings as leading Democrats and President Joe Biden sought to raise the top tax rate on corporations to 26.5% from the current 21%.
The FTSE MIB climbed down by 0.55% to 25,709.00. In the cash markets, the DAX Germany was trading up 1.03% to 15,490.65. CAC 40 in France fell by 0.91% to 6,963.22 while the FTSE 100 in the U.K. were down by 0.91% to 6,963.35. ,at the time of writing.
