Business Recorder
SINGAPORE: Stocks fell , the dollar firmed and oil rose on Thursday after US President Donald Trump said Washington’s “core strategic objectives” in the Iran war were nearing completion but stopped short of providing a clear outline of when the conflict would end. The prospect of the end to the month-long U.S.-Israeli war with Iran has lifted global stocks and knocked the dollar off its recent highs in the past two sessions after a brutal March where soaring oil prices sent risk assets into a tailspin. But Trump, in his prime-time speech, said the US will strike Iran “extremely hard” over the next two to three weeks and hit the country into the “Stone Ages.” That sent stocks retreating, with U.S. stock futures down 0.67% while European futures were 0.1% lower. MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan slid 0.75%. Japan’s Nikkei reversed course to trade down 0.79% in volatile trading. Analysts and investors were focusing on when and how the Strait of Hormuz, a major fuel shipment route, would reopen and ease the bottleneck in supply that has hit Asian economies hard. Iran has fired repeatedly on Gulf countries, some home to U.S. bases, and is using the Strait of Hormuz, which carries a fifth of global oil and liquefied natural gas, as leverage. Higher energy prices in March stoked fears of global inflation with worries about slowing growth also sapping sentiment. The US dollar has been the haven of choice among investors during the tumult and the greenback rose against most currencies after the speech. The euro weakened 0.25% to $1.156. The front-month Brent contract for June rose over 3% to $104.75 per barrel.
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