In this week’s recap, U.S. stocks were lower again this week with an ominous note, after a broad technology-sector selloff, sending the major U.S. stock indexes sharply lower & Treasury yields logging declines, not seen since some of the worst days of the pandemic last year. European shares fell on Friday, heading lower after a downturn in U.S. stocks on a tech slide & fears around the Omicron coronavirus variant hitting economic recovery. Chinese tech stocks in Hong Kong plunged after ride-hailing giant Didi announced Friday, that it will begin taking steps to delist from the U.S. NYSE.
The era of big Chinese companies heading to the U.S. to raise money may be coming to an end. Ride-hailing firm DiDi Global, the “Uber of China,” said it plans to delist its shares from the New York Stock Exchange in preference for Hong Kong, likely at the behest of China’s government in Beijing. Shares in New York are already -44% down the IPO price from late June. The stock fell over -17% on Friday, on the news to $6.45. The stock is down -28.88% in the last 3 months, on a market cap of $37.62B.
Bitcoin prices fell sharply early Saturday by almost 20%. In the past 24 hours, 410,000 cryptocurrency accounts have been liquidated for a total of $2.6 billion (the largest liquidation was $27 million). Ether lost more than -14% in the last 24 hours, to a low near $3,500. The drop is related to turbulent trading since the omicron variant Covid appeared.
South Korea’s Hyundai putting more money into electric vehicles & robotics. Another important part is to transform the company from a conventional carmaker to embracing hydrogen-based technology, but the lack of hydrogen refueling stations & maintenance costs for parts are huge. Hyundai is the only global car firm besides Japan’s Toyota Motor Corp. to have made a large investment in hydrogen, pledging to have all of its new commercial vehicles run on either batteries or hydrogen fuel cells by 2028.
The U.S. Congress passed a bill on Thursday to keep the federal government funded until Feb. 18; the U.S. economy added 210K jobs in November, far below economists’ expectations; the CBOE Volatility Index or “VIX,” surged to 31.12 on Wednesday; Australia’s October trade surplus was 11.22B Australian dollars ($7.97B U.S.); global Food prices high all-time high; Singapore increased its gold reserves by about +20% earlier this year; consumer prices across 19 countries in the Eurozone are rising at a record rate; Musk warns SpaceX employees risk of bankruptcy if Starship engine crisis isn’t fixed; Barbados woke up Tuesday as a republic.
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