8@eight: Positive start in store as reporting season rolls on

By John Kicklighter
Updated August 17 2017 - 10:18am, first published 10:11am
The information of stocks that lost in prices are displayed on an electronic board inside the Australian Securities Exchange, operated by ASX Ltd., in Sydney, Australia, on Friday, July 24, 2015. The Australian dollar slumped last week as a gauge of Chinese manufacturing unexpectedly contracted, aggravating the impact of declines in copper and iron ore prices. Photographer: Brendon Thorne/Bloomberg
The information of stocks that lost in prices are displayed on an electronic board inside the Australian Securities Exchange, operated by ASX Ltd., in Sydney, Australia, on Friday, July 24, 2015. The Australian dollar slumped last week as a gauge of Chinese manufacturing unexpectedly contracted, aggravating the impact of declines in copper and iron ore prices. Photographer: Brendon Thorne/Bloomberg
MARKETS. 7 JUNE 2011. AFR PIC BY PETER BRAIG. STOCK EXCHANGE, SYDNEY, STOCKS. GENERIC PIC. ASX. STOCKMARKET. MARKET.
MARKETS. 7 JUNE 2011. AFR PIC BY PETER BRAIG. STOCK EXCHANGE, SYDNEY, STOCKS. GENERIC PIC. ASX. STOCKMARKET. MARKET.
Stock information is displayed on an electronic board inside the Australian Securities Exchange, operated by ASX Ltd., in Sydney, Australia, on Friday, July 24, 2015. The Australian dollar slumped last week as a gauge of Chinese manufacturing unexpectedly contracted, aggravating the impact of declines in copper and iron ore prices. Photographer: Brendon Thorne/Bloomberg
Stock information is displayed on an electronic board inside the Australian Securities Exchange, operated by ASX Ltd., in Sydney, Australia, on Friday, July 24, 2015. The Australian dollar slumped last week as a gauge of Chinese manufacturing unexpectedly contracted, aggravating the impact of declines in copper and iron ore prices. Photographer: Brendon Thorne/Bloomberg

That spark of risk appetite that helped revive risk trends at the start of this week has fizzled. As Wednesday's session progressed to the later sessions, the already tempered lift in speculative appetite completely deflated. It was easy to see conviction fading from the strong ASX 200 and Nikkei 225 performance yesterday to the more restrained DAX and FTSE 100 progress to the virtually unchanged US indices. Fundamentally, there wasn't a single event or theme that the market would anchor its sentiment to. Rather, there simply wasn't enough fuel to keep the fires stoked. That said, an ill-fitting equilibrium in markets can turn into outright risk aversion should any number of simmering issues - divergent monetary policy, concern over financial stability (China) or political issues (US) among others - catch serious traction.

The long and short of it

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