After heavy losses, the American stock markets recovered on Thursday. The Dow closed Thursday with a small loss, the Nasdaq went out with a small gain.
The stock exchanges in New York showed a remarkable recovery on Thursday, mostly at the end of the trading day as they trimmed heavy losses faced earlier in the day.
The mood came rather under pressure from the news about the arrest in Canada of the financial director of the Chinese technology group Huawei. This sparked the fear of a further escalation of the trade war between China and the United States.
The Dow-Jones index ended 0.3 percent lower at 24,947.67 points. The broad S & P 500 dropped 0.2 percent to 2695.95 points and the Nasdaq added 0.4 percent to 7188.25 points. On Wednesday, Wall Street was closed due to a national day of mourning for the late former president George HW Bush.
Police in Canada arrested Meng Wanzhou, one of the Vice Presidents of Huawei and the daughter of founder Ren Zhengfei. She is threatened to be extradited to the US where the company is suspected of violating US sanctions against Iran. Heavy losses were seen on the stock exchanges in Asia and especially in Europe.
Oil prices ended sharply lower on Thursday as the OPEC countries wrapped up their first day of talks but could not agree on the terms of a drop in production, which markets were waiting to halt the fall in oil prices. The barrel of US light crude oil (WTI) for January delivery fell 2.65% Thursday, to $51.49 on the Nymex, while the Brent crude oil barrel for the February delivery sold 2.44% at $60.06 (February contract). The oil stocks were under pressure due to lower oil prices. ExxonMobil and Chevron surrendered up to 1.2 percent and service providers such as Schlumberger and Halliburton had to give up to 5.3 percent.
On the economic front, the Fed published its Beige Book on Wednesday, which provides insight into the state of the economy. This showed that economic growth in the US continues.
