Weekly Market Recap – January 3rd, 2020
In the Markets
Marking the transition from 2019 to 2020, the week began with extended bullish sentiments in equity markets. Through Thursday’s close, the S&P 500 gained 0.55%, in part because of China’s announcement of plans to cut the reserve requirement ratio by 50 basis points on January 6th. Friday’s trade session, however, saw a single day loss of 0.71% in the S&P 500, leading to a net loss of 0.16%.
Friday’s losses were mostly due to a U.S. airstrike in Iraq that killed Iran’s General Qassem Soleimani. Iran quickly threatened retaliation, escalating already high tensions in the Middle East. On the week, the Dow Jones slipped 0.04%, the NASDAQ managed a 0.2% gain, while the Russell fell 0.5%. In addition to the situation between the U.S. and Iran, manufacturing data was down for December, with the ISM Manufacturing Index falling to its low since June 2009.
WTI Crude outperformed Brent futures, with the former gaining 2.15% while the latter advanced just 0.65%. Crude oil products gasoline and heating oil also differed greatly in their weekly performance, with gasoline moving up just 0.09% while heating oil grew 0.58%. Natural gas futures lost 1.3% on the week.
In precious metals, platinum and palladium paved the way, both exceeding 4% in growth on the week. Platinum gained 4.35% and palladium increased by 4.39%. While the other commodities in the sector posted muted gains by comparison, gold and silver still rose on the week. Gold climbed 2.26% while silver added 1.16%. Copper fell on the week, losing 1.48%.
Agricultural commodities’ performance for the week was mixed, varying from flat to substantial losses. Soybeans performed better than the rest of the sector, losing just 0.01%. Wheat fell 0.41% while corn dropped 0.9%. Lean hogs dropped 2.88%, while the futures market’s cup of morning posted losses. Sugar lost 1.7%, coffee dropped 4.64%, while milk plummeted 12.28%.
World Cup Trading Championships
Tuesday marked the last day of trading for the 2019 World Cup Trading Championships. The standings are pending a final audit, but as of Tuesday’s close Sadanand Kalasabail remained in first place at a net return of 266%, followed by Ryan Alderson’s second best 183.1% net return. Fabian Fischer climbed into third place with a net return of 140.7%, followed by Durai Ramasamy’s fourth place net return of 134.5%. Sebastian Baumgaertel rounded out the leaderboard with a net return of 97.1%.
As the 2019 competition concluded, the Global Cup Derivatives Trading Championship crossed its halfway point. Through Friday, Jan Smolen held onto his first place position with a 172.9% net return. Wayne Wan closed the week in second place with a net return of 128%, and it was Maxim Schulz’s 109.2% net return that took third place on the week. Archie Ma landed in fourth place at a 103.3% net return, followed by Stefan Seibert’s fifth-best 95.3% net return.
Trading futures and forex involves significant risk of loss and is not suitable for everyone. Past performance is not necessarily indicative of future results. World Cup Championship (WCC ) accounts do not necessarily represent all the trading accounts controlled by a given competitor. WCC competitors may control accounts that produce results substantially different than the results achieved in their WCC accounts. WCC entrants may trade more than one account in the competition. CME Group is the trademark of CME Group, Inc. The Globe logo is a trademark of Chicago Mercantile Exchange, Inc.