Mideast Stocks Plunge As Trade Woes, Regional Conflict Bite

In what could be a preview of what to expect on Monday, Mideast shares tumbled on Sunday in one of the worst days of 2019.

Israeli stocks plunged nearly 3% in what looks like the largest single-session loss of the year on the heels of Wall Street’s Friday rout.

The Israeli military launched airstrikes against what it said were Quds Force targets in Syria. A spokesman said the strikes were aimed at disrupting operations which had planned drone attacks on targets in northern Israel over the past several days.

“Iran has no immunity anywhere. Our forces operate in every sector against the Iranian aggression”, Benjamin Netanyahu said. “If someone rises up to kill you, kill him first”.

Incidentally, that’s the approach Donald Trump is taking to China on trade, and Beijing is increasingly prone to adopting the same strategy towards the US, although Xi much prefers to retaliate rather than instigate.

The prospect of new tariffs on US oil imports to China sent WTI sharply lower on Friday, but more relevant for the Mideast is the possibility that demand destruction tied to a trade-related global downturn undercuts prices across the board. It’s possible Beijing could eventually decide to ignore Washington’s demands to curtail Iranian crude imports. At least one bank has suggested that Chinese refiners could start tapping Iranian supplies, leading to an “uber-bearish” scenario for oil prices.

Read more: The Stars May Have Aligned For One Bank’s ‘Uber-Bearish, Extreme’ Oil Scenario

Saudi shares fell more than 2% on Sunday to lead Gulf state losses.

As Bloomberg reminds you, “China is the biggest trading partner for Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Kuwait and Oman”.


 

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4 thoughts on “Mideast Stocks Plunge As Trade Woes, Regional Conflict Bite

    1. Like you I got premature (way early ) this time but on the brighter side missed the violent swings in 2000 as well as 2009….Nobody gives you a 48 hours notice on events like Mondays promises to become and selling at this late juncture is about like trying to leave the theater in a fire.. You can definitely get whiplash from a reflex rally that most surely promises to be a ‘dead cat bounce’ ( apologies to my kitties)
      I’ll go out on a limb and speculate that Monday is memorable primary reason is the system is running out of excuses , the boy having cried Wolf too often already….

    2. You must be Soros or something thinking you have the capital to move $10 trillion in market cap any sort of meaningful direction outside their current trading range.

      Sure, fear is warranted. But be reasonable. Go back to loading up on SP500 puts or triple-levered short ETFs and quit pretending FANGMAN gives a crap that you think their PE is too high

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