By Rae Wee
SINGAPORE (Reuters) -Global markets greeted Donald Trump’s presidency with apprehension on Tuesday in moves that were highly sensitive to headlines over the newly sworn-in president’s plans for trade relations and tariffs in particular.
U.S. markets were closed for a holiday on Monday, so the first reactions to Trump’s return to the White House were felt during Asian trade on Tuesday.
Just as investors cheered the possibility of a delay in Trump’s implementation of tariffs following a brief mention of the topic in his inauguration speech, the U.S. president said shortly after that he was mulling imposing 25% tariffs on Mexico and Canada as soon as Feb. 1.
That sent the Mexican peso sliding 1% against the dollar while the Canadian dollar tumbled to a five-year low of C$1.4515.
The news also quickly reversed gains in global stock markets and sent the greenback strongly rebounding across the board in choppy trade.
“The first few hours of the Trump administration have underscored that the policy environment will be dynamic once again and markets should brace for volatility,” said Charu Chanana, Saxo’s chief investment strategist.
“Clearly, the markets celebrated too soon with tariff threats missing at the outset in Trump’s inaugural speech.”
U.S. stock futures pared their strong gains from earlier in the session, leaving Nasdaq futures last 0.08% lower, while S&P 500 futures were up a mere 0.07%.
EUROSTOXX 50 futures fell 0.25%. FTSE futures eased 0.02%.
Japan’s Nikkei similarly swung between losses and gains and was last up 0.13%.
Trump’s plans for hefty import tariffs have been a key area of focus for financial markets on the view that such policies will stoke inflation and run the U.S. economy red hot again, which would boost the dollar and hurt bonds.
Some investors had expected a swift imposition of tariffs from the moment he took office, so the lack of any concrete moves initially sparked a brief relief rally across stocks and U.S. Treasuries.
“At some point, we are quite certain that Trump will start to move on the tariff measures … It’s quite clear what his intent is,” said Khoon Goh, head of Asia research at ANZ.
“The fact that he hasn’t addressed this on day one doesn’t mean that it is off the agenda. It is definitely firmly on the agenda, it’s just that we have to wait and see what shape or form he takes.”
The benchmark 10-year U.S. Treasury yield was last 6.7 basis points lower at 4.5440%. Yields move inversely to bond prices.
The two-year Treasury yield eased 4.7 bps to 4.2255%.
In currencies, the dollar clawed back its losses from earlier in the session and distanced itself from a two-week low.
The euro slid 0.3% to $1.0385, while sterling weakened 0.32% to $1.2290.
WHAT NEXT?
Over in China, stocks were volatile as investors struggled to make sense of how Trump’s plans for tariffs on the world’s second-largest economy could shape up.
While he has threatened tariffs of up to 60% on imports of Chinese goods, the lack of any immediate action thus far has left markets treading with caution.
The CSI300 blue-chip index last traded 0.13% lower as did the Shanghai Composite Index, which fell 0.35%.
Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index fared better as it rose 0.42%.
That helped lift MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan, which was up 0.34%.
“Not mentioning tariffs on China is definitely a leg up for sentiment so we saw an initial jump across the board, but that also means that will leave investors in a guessing game. It will remain an overhang,” said Kenny Ng, securities strategist at China Everbright (OTC:CHFFF) Securities International.
The onshore yuan held to some of its overnight gains and last stood at 7.2781 per dollar, while its offshore counterpart eased 0.2% to 7.2801.
Elsewhere, Trump’s new crypto token gave up some of its strong gains on Tuesday to fall 20% to $35.27, after having soared to more than $10 billion in market value at the start of the week.
Bitcoin dipped 0.08% to $102,460.68, easing away from a record high hit on Monday.
The prospect of looser regulations around crypto policy under the Trump administration has been met with fanfare by the industry and turbocharged a rally across digital assets following his election victory in November.
In commodities, oil prices weakened after Trump announced a plan to maximise U.S. oil and gas production by declaring a national emergency.
Brent crude futures languished at $80.18 a barrel, near its lowest in over a week. U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude futures sank 1.46% to $76.74 per barrel from Friday’s close. There was no settlement on Jan. 20 due to the U.S. public holiday. [O/R]
Spot gold gained 0.5% to $2,722.01 an ounce. [GOL/]