Morning Briefing: French elections ahead, stocks lower after terror attack

French elections ahead, stocks lower after terror attack

French presidential elections take place Sunday and investors are nervous ahead of a potential shock.

Following Brexit and Trump, nothing is taken for granted, although the recent Dutch election raised fears of a right-wing surge but did not materialise. The election is unlikely to result in a clear winner, leading to a second round next month.

Adding pressure to European indexes is the latest terrorist attack on Paris with a police officer shot dead at close range Wednesday night.

European markets are mostly lower with the election dominating although PMI data is also being weighed with France and the Eurozone gaining while Germany’s PMI is lower.

In Asia, the focus is also on France but markets closed mostly higher following a strong lead from Wall Street.
Wall Street and Toronto are expected to open higher. Canadian consumer price data is due along with US PMI.
 

	Latest	1 month ago	1 year ago
North America (previous session)
US Dow Jones	20,578.71 (+0.85 per cent)	-0.43 per cent	+14.44 per cent
TSX Composite	11,426.91 (+0.74 per cent)	+0.06 per cent	+9.30 per cent
Europe (at 5.00am ET)
UK FTSE	7,116.17 (-0.03 per cent)	-3.55 per cent	+11.51 per cent
German DAX	12,011.76 (-0.13 per cent)	+0.41 per cent	+15.10 per cent
Asia (at close)
China CSI 300	3,466.71 (+0.13 per cent)	+0.01 per cent	+9.69 per cent
Japan Nikkei	18,620.75 (+1.03 per cent)	-4.29 per cent	+7.24 per cent
Other Data (at 5.00am ET)
Oil (Brent)	Oil (WTI)	Gold	Can. Dollar
52.97 (-0.04 per cent)	50.68 (-0.06 per cent)	1282.90 (-0.07 per cent)	U$0.7427
			Aus. Dollar
			U$0.7534

Singapore ambassador warns of West’s protectionism

The growing protectionist movement in some Western countries is bad news for Asia, where free trade policies are key to the region’s prosperity.

That was the message from Singapore’s Tommy Koh an ambassador for the city-state’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, who said Thursday that the “liberal world order” that has been in place since the end of the Second World War, is in jeopardy.

Reuters reports that Koh is concerned that the trends in Asia and the West are moving in opposite directions.