Headlines:
- BOE announces to carry out temporary purchases of long-dated UK government bonds
- Will the BOE band aid work?
- Kwarteng reportedly to ask financiers not to bet against the pound
- ECB's Lagarde: We will continue to hike rates in the next several meetings
- ECB's Kažimír: 75 bps is a very good option to keep the pace of tightening
- ECB's Holzmann: 50 bps rate hike is maybe the minimum next month
- Germany October GfK consumer sentiment -42.5 vs -39.0 expected
- Chinese yuan slumps to lowest since the global financial crisis
- Russia says there is no clarity on timings of Nord Stream repair
Markets:
- CHF leads, GBP lags on the day
- European equities lower; S&P 500 futures down 0.6%
- US 10-year yields down 2 bps to 3.943%
- Gold down 0.4% to $1,622.27
- WTI crude up 0.3% to $78.75
- Bitcoin down 0.8% to $18,911
It's a crazy time in markets when you see a central bank has to intervene in a big way as a result of its own government's policy doing and not an external shock. Yet, that is the case with the UK as the Bank of England was forced to restart QE in its £2 trillion gilt market, in order to restore function and orderly market conditions.
UK gilt yields responded in kind, falling sharply with 10-year yields down 30 bps on the day to 4.20% with the low touching 4.01% earlier after the announcement. However, the pound was dumped after an initial whipsaw that brought cable to a high of 1.0838 and is now down 1.4% to 1.0580 at time of writing.
The BOE announcement provided a brief relief for risk trades, as US futures pared a roughly 1% drop before falling back now as we approach North America trading. In the major currencies space, it is still all about the dollar though as the greenback continues its rampaging run across the board.
EUR/USD is down 0.3% to 0.9555 as the downside pressure persists while USD/JPY is steady around 144.60-70 levels as buyers stay cautiously poised to try and retest the 145.00 mark amid intervention fears.
Commodity currencies are staying on the backfoot with USD/CAD up 0.3% to 1.3770, off earlier highs of 1.3832. Meanwhile, the aussie is continuing its journey to reclaim its Pacific peso title with another 0.6% drop to 0.6395 - though also off its earlier low of 0.6365.
It might be the case that the UK circus is stealing the spotlight in markets but let's not be too distracted as the buy the dollar, sell everything else narrative is very much still the main narrative.
