By: Mahmoud Gamal
Mubasher: Japanese stocks ended Monday in the red, falling by more than 3%, extending losses incurred on Friday and coinciding with the decline in oil prices.
The Nikkei index dropped 3.5% to 16,019.18 points, its lowest level since mid-March and 15% since the beginning of 2016, while the wider Topix index fell 3.47% to 1,284.54 points on Monday.
Investment portfolios are shying away from the market as the world awaits the results of the Federal Reserve’s meeting this week regarding interests rates as well as the Bank of Japan’s (BOJ) meeting on quantitative easing, Alaa El Din Farhan, market analyst at Trust Capital, told Mubasher.
The US Central Bank is scheduled to hold its meeting on Tuesday evening and conclude it on Wednesday, while the BOJ is to convene on Thursday to discuss its quantitative easing strategy.
The analyst said he expects global and Japanese markets to see further declines amid retreating liquidity, with investors likely to rush to safe haven assets like gold and other metals until markets stabilise.
By 7:30am GMT, the dollar fell 1.01% to 105.96 points against the Yen, according to data by Market Watch.
Translated by: Nada Adel Sobhi
