Asia treads water under a tariff cloud — Calm on the surface, convexity brewing beneath
The post Asia treads water under a tariff cloud — Calm on the surface, convexity brewing beneath appeared on BitcoinEthereumNews.com. Treading water Asian stocks look set to tread water today, with the looming impact of tariffs hanging over the tape like a grand piano teetering above a crowded street — and Beijing standing dead center beneath it. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent didn’t mince words: China’s been sidelined while the U.S. fast-tracks bespoke trade deals with 15 to 17 other countries. The message is clear — the next move has to come from Beijing if they want any hope of disarming this ticking tariff bomb. The optics couldn’t be worse. Two global heavyweights are locked in a dangerous economic staring contest, neither willing to flinch, even as the cost mounts. For Asia risk markets, it’s a high-wire act with no safety net. Until something cracks — or a real handshake materializes — expect traders to stay jittery, position lightly, and volatility to be coiled tight. More immediately, Asia’s open looks sluggish, pinned between a late-session technical bump in U.S. stocks and a gauntlet of risk events ahead. Futures are showing marginal moves across Hong Kong and Sydney, while U.S. S&P futures contracts dipped after Monday’s choppy session. As April’s jitter-fest draws to a close, don’t expect May to be any gentler. Volatility will stay wired tight, with headline whiplash running the game. The five-day U.S. rally — the longest stretch since November — now faces a tough test: a wave of earnings from tech titans, along with key data releases on jobs, inflation, and growth. The optimism that briefly buoyed the Asian and European sessions on Monday gave way quickly once U.S. traders took a ‘glass half-empty’ view of the global economic mess brewing beneath the surface. Although some will spin this market stall as a classic sign of the risk-on balloon deflating or momentum running out of gas, the truth…
The post Asia treads water under a tariff cloud — Calm on the surface, convexity brewing beneath appeared on BitcoinEthereumNews.com.
Treading water Asian stocks look set to tread water today, with the looming impact of tariffs hanging over the tape like a grand piano teetering above a crowded street — and Beijing standing dead center beneath it. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent didn’t mince words: China’s been sidelined while the U.S. fast-tracks bespoke trade deals with 15 to 17 other countries. The message is clear — the next move has to come from Beijing if they want any hope of disarming this ticking tariff bomb. The optics couldn’t be worse. Two global heavyweights are locked in a dangerous economic staring contest, neither willing to flinch, even as the cost mounts. For Asia risk markets, it’s a high-wire act with no safety net. Until something cracks — or a real handshake materializes — expect traders to stay jittery, position lightly, and volatility to be coiled tight. More immediately, Asia’s open looks sluggish, pinned between a late-session technical bump in U.S. stocks and a gauntlet of risk events ahead. Futures are showing marginal moves across Hong Kong and Sydney, while U.S. S&P futures contracts dipped after Monday’s choppy session. As April’s jitter-fest draws to a close, don’t expect May to be any gentler. Volatility will stay wired tight, with headline whiplash running the game. The five-day U.S. rally — the longest stretch since November — now faces a tough test: a wave of earnings from tech titans, along with key data releases on jobs, inflation, and growth. The optimism that briefly buoyed the Asian and European sessions on Monday gave way quickly once U.S. traders took a ‘glass half-empty’ view of the global economic mess brewing beneath the surface. Although some will spin this market stall as a classic sign of the risk-on balloon deflating or momentum running out of gas, the truth…
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