First it was gold, and now it's silver. The metal fell victim to heavy selling on Monday on U.S. dollar strength and as investors turned more cautious.
Australia's dollar has received its fair share of whacking lately and perhaps it's time to give the currency a bit of a break, currency strategists say.
Reports that China may step up the diversification of its huge foreign exchange reserves is not great news for U.S. Treasurys, already under pressure from talk about an easing in the Fed's bond-buying program.
While growth in the world's third largest economy, Japan, surpassed expectations in the first quarter, an important pillar of growth was missing: revival in capital spending.
Japanese equities have risen a "bit too fast" and appear to be somewhat "bubbly," according to the former vice finance minister of Japan, as the Nikkei crossed the key 15,000 on Wednesday.
The boom in equity markets from Frankfurt to New York and Tokyo has yet to reach Shanghai, which continues to lag behind its global peers. Still, analysts reckon China stocks will soon play catch-up.
According to local media reports, China could lower its official growth forecast to 7 percent next year – a move that suggests Beijing is growing more comfortable with slower pace of growth.
If an article in Monday's Wall Street Journal is anything to go by, the U.S. Fed is getting ready to unwind monetary stimulus. That prospect is unlikely to be as alarming for markets as feared, analysts tell CNBC.
The ECB is perhaps the best hope of bridging the political and economic fault lines in a union where cooperation was supposed to be the hallmark of a new Europe.