Analysis-Investors expect market selloff will slow, stretch and spread

August 8, 2024

This week’s huge selloff in global markets, triggered by an unwinding of yen-funded trades, is far from over and could eventually spread to credit markets, impair some banks and possibly hurt the U.S. dollar, fund managers say. By Thursday, market volatility had subsided but stock markets struggled for direction and investors tried to guess how many more yen-funded leveraged trades remained to be unwound. The market mayhem since last Friday – which pushed Japan’s Nikkei index into bear market territory and caused the benchmark U.S. S&P 500 to crumble 6% in five trading days – was triggered by a Bank of Japan rate rise last week, that gutted billions of dollars worth yen-funded trades as the yen soared 10% in a month.