Weekly news summary for March 25 to March 31
Friday, Mar. 25: European Gas Drops as US Agrees to LNG Supply Deal
European natural gas weakened on Friday in response to the US’s decision to sell more liquefied natural gas (LNG) to Europe to help reduce its reliance on Russian gas imports.
Benchmark gas futures were down 9.3% after swinging up and down earlier in the session, as the White House agreed to increase LNG shipments to at least 15 billion cubic meters this year and secure demand for 50 billion cubic meters a year by 2030.
Monday, Mar. 28: Bond Yields Gain on Possible Half-Point Fed Hike
US bond yields stayed close to their highest levels in three years on Monday, as the potential for half-point hikes instead of quarter-point increases in the Federal Reserve interest rates due to broad inflation remained.
The US 2-Year Treasury yield traded at 2.41% before easing to 2.37%, and 10-Year Treasury yields gained only one basis point to 2.50%, while the US Treasury yield curve inverted for the first time since 2006 on the continued selloff, with short-dated yields reaching their highest since 2019.
Tuesday, Mar. 29: Apple Set for Longest Winning Streak since 2003
Shares of Apple Inc. continued to surge on Tuesday, posting its 11th day of gains, an uncommon achievement in the US tech giant’s four-decade stock market history, putting it on track to its longest winning streak since 2003.
Apple’s rally added $407 billion in market value, leading major tech stocks towards recovery after a weak start this year and avoiding news of production cuts that left the iPhone maker’s stock 1% and 4.7% short of regaining 2022 losses and a $3 trillion market cap, respectively.
Wednesday, Mar. 30: Ronin Network Hacked to Lose More Than $600M
Ronin Network has incurred $625 million worth of cryptocurrency losses after the blockchain operating non-fungible token (NFT) game Axie Infinity encountered a major security breach, resulting in perhaps one of the biggest crypto hacks to date.
A blog post from Substack said Ronin bridge and Katana Dex had been halted after about 173,600 Ether and 25.5 million USD Coin (USDC) were taken out from Ronin Bridge in two transactions on Mar. 3, with the hacker using private keys to make the fake withdrawals.
Thursday, Mar. 31: Chinahttps://youtu.be/GxsrD6RmH9w’s Factory, Services Activity Fall Together
China’s factory and services activity declined below the 50-point mark for the first time since the COVID-19 outbreak last year, increasing the need for more policy to keep the world’s second-largest economy on stable grounds.
The National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) stated on Thursday that the official Chinese manufacturing Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI) contracted to 49.5 from 50.2 in February, while the non-manufacturing PMI fell to 48.4 from 51.6 in the previous month.
