This was a bad week for currencies and bonds, but a mixed week for stocks and commodities. The best performing asset class was palladium, which rose 7.3%, followed by crude oil, which gained 5.2%. The weakest asset was Bitcoin, down 6.6%, followed by long term bonds (TLT), off 5.3%.
The weakest government-issued currencies were the Yen (down 4.5%) and the Euro (off 4.3%). The “strongest” was the Chinese Yuan, which fell only 1.5%.
US stocks were down (the DJIA lost 1.9%, the S&P 500 lost 1.4%) but European and Japanese equities rose 0.4% each. Gold stocks were the strongest equities, with the HUI rising 2.2% to close at 4.2g, a critical resistance level.
Other metals were mixed, with copper up 2.9% while silver fell 2.3% and platinum dropped 0.7%.
Note that every asset class except Bitcoin is lower today than it was a year ago – particularly palladium and crude oil, which are off 37.5% and 34.5% respectively, even after their recent rallies.
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