Wall Street bounced but European markets wobbled as investors weighed fresh interest rate hikes by central banks and signs of a possible pause in US monetary tightening following turmoil in the banking sector.
Central bankers chose to continue their battle against inflation, even as investors had hoped for a halt, over concerns that rate hikes could further rock the banking system following the collapse of three US regional lenders this month. The Bank of England and Norway’s central bank raised their rates by a quarter point on Thursday, after a similar move by the US Federal Reserve the day before and a heftier half-point hike by the European Central Bank last week.
Switzerland’s central bank went with a half-percentage-point increase as it declared that authorities had “put a halt to the crisis” at Credit Suisse after co-engineering the embattled bank’s buyout by domestic rival UBS over the weekend.— AFP
