Global stock markets fell on Thursday as Chinese manufacturing slowed and Russian shelling near Ukraine’s capital shattered expectations for peace negotiations.
London, Shanghai, Paris, and Tokyo are all down, while Frankfurt is up.
In New York, oil slipped about $5 per barrel, but remained above $100, following claims that US Vice President Joe Biden might transfer US reserves to help calm rising prices amid fears of an interruption in Russian supplies.
OPEC and its allies, including Russia, will decide how much crude to pump into the world on Thursday. Analysts predict that the OPEC+ group will stick to its plan of modest hikes to restore production restrictions achieved during the coronavirus outbreak in 2020.
After Moscow indicated it would pull back operations in the region to create trust, Russian soldiers shelled sites near Kyiv and another city. On Friday, virtual negotiations to try to halt the five-week-old battle are expected.
According to Stephen Innes of SPI Asset Management, Russia is putting a damper on reports of productive cease-fire talks.
The FTSE 100 in London fell less than 0.1 percent to 7,575.04, while the DAX in Frankfurt rose 0.1 percent to 7,578.75. The CAC 40 index in Paris dropped 0.1 percent to 6,743.19.
On Wall Street, the benchmark S& P 500 index’s futures were 0.2 percent higher a day after plunging due to weaker-than-expected US economic growth. The Dow industrials’ prospects remained mostly unchanged.
In Asia, the Shanghai Composite Indicator slid 0.4 percent to 3,252.20 after a five-month low in a Chinese manufacturing activity index following the closure of parts of Shanghai and two smaller industrial areas to combat coronavirus epidemics.
