London (AFP) – Stock markets fell on Wednesday and oil prices rose as investors weighed the chances of a deal to end the Mideast war. This comes after US President Donald Trump stated that US and Iranian representatives held “very good” talks at the United Nations. Trump added that a three-hour meeting on Tuesday was “very productive” and that the two countries “have another one scheduled in the very near future.”
Hopes for a deal to get Gulf oil and gas flowing freely through the Strait of Hormuz had sent oil prices down sharply since last week. However, in the absence of further developments, Brent North crude, the international benchmark, climbed almost 2 percent back above $100 per barrel on Wednesday. Stocks opened lower on Wall Street after the Nasdaq hit an all-time high on Tuesday, driven by enthusiasm for artificial intelligence (AI), while most European and Asian indices also pulled back.
Stephen Innes at Quintex Intel noted that the UN meeting matters “because it shifts the market from pure (war) escalation pricing toward a genuine diplomatic process, even if a final deal still looks distant.” The OECD on Wednesday stated that global economic growth had been “resilient” in many countries despite the war, as it slightly raised its economic output forecasts for 2026.
Earlier in the day, oil prices had fallen on a report that Saudi Arabia, the world’s biggest crude exporter, had rebooted operations along its East-West Pipeline, a crucial oil export route that had been shut down by drone attacks. A source quoted by Bloomberg indicated that the kingdom aims to resume exports later this week. However, while Saudi oil giant Aramco reportedly told Asian refiners they could soon pick up crude from the Red Sea port of Yanbu, it informed their European counterparts that they would not be allocated oil in October.
In Asian trading, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index closed down one percent, shrugging off an announcement by Chinese tech giant Alibaba about its expansion of overseas data centres. Shanghai lost 0.4 percent. Alibaba, a frontrunner in China’s AI industry, said the move would target markets across Europe and the Middle East. This announcement follows a renewed burst of confidence in artificial intelligence this week, with Anthropic and OpenAI releasing new, cheaper AI models within hours of each other. Anthropic’s release comes a few weeks before its expected stock market debut, while OpenAI has delayed its IPO plans until next year.
South Korea’s tech-rich Kospi and Taiwan’s Taiex index, home to chipmaking titan TSMC, gained nearly one percent.
Key figures at around 1445 GMT include:
Brent North Sea Crude: UP 1.8 percent at $101.08 per barrel
West Texas Intermediate: UP 1.2 percent at $91.64 per barrel
New York – DOW: DOWN 0.3 percent at 51,685.81 points
New York – S&P 500: DOWN 0.3 percent at 7,741.74
New York – Nasdaq Composite: DOWN 0.4 percent at 27,131.76
London – FTSE 100: UP 0.1 percent at 10,714.54
Paris – CAC 40: DOWN 0.5 percent at 8,118.61
Frankfurt – DAX: DOWN 0.5 percent at 25,449.67
Hong Kong – Hang Seng Index: DOWN 1.0 percent at 24,834.12 (close)
Shanghai – Composite: DOWN 0.4 percent at 3,936.52 (close)
Tokyo – Nikkei 225: closed for a holiday
Exchange rates include:
Euro/dollar: DOWN at $1.1403 from $1.1451 on Tuesday
Pound/dollar: DOWN at $1.3268 from $1.3344
Dollar/yen: UP at 158.08 from 157.37
Euro/pound: UP at 85.95 pence from 85.81 pence
© 2024 AFP
