The European markets just sort of gave up on Friday, unable to resist the urge to fall further into the red in the face of the various global uncertainties currently giving investors a stress headache.
The FTSE led the charge lower, with the UK index tumbling half a percent. That took it below 7300 for the first time in nearly 5 months, and leaves it more than 200 points adrift from where it started September.
The reason why the FTSE was a smidge worse than its eurozone peers was the pound’s growth. With the UK’s annual house price growth at a 9 month high according to Halifax sterling rose 0.3% against the dollar, allowing cable to tickle $1.297, and 0.2% against the euro, sending it towards €1.115.
The eurozone was in a similarly bad mood. The DAX slipped another 0.3%, leaving the German index at its worst price since the end of March, while the CAC dipped 0.2%, causing it to fall away from the 5250 level it had held above after the bell.
The Dow Jones is set to join in with this general malaise, the futures pointing to a 50 points slide that’d return the index to 25950. Still to come is August’s non-farm jobs report; wage growth is expected to slip from 0.3% to 0.2%, while the headline figure is forecast to bounce from 157k to 191k. Given the relative certainty of a September rate hike from the Fed, however, these figures might not move the markets much, especially if investors get a trade war update at any point this afternoon.
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