China's Stock Markets Dive—Just Before G-20 Summit
China’s stock markets dove to their lowest performance in a month, tumbling 6.4% on Thursday in the biggest slump in 2016.
The drop came the day before today’s G-20 meeting of the world’s industrialized nations, where China’s central bank governor Zhou Xiaochuan addressed global anxiety over China’s slumping economy with some better-than-expected data, the Wall Street Journal reports.
Meanwhile, stateside, a Q4 GDP report—that almost doubled expectations—provided a shot in the arm to equity markets, sending stocks surging and at close to $35 a barrel, even lighted a fire in oil trading, CNBC reported.
WTI was up more than 3.5%, above $34/barrel, while Dow futures held about 100 points higher after the GDP report—the higher crude prices add a little extra weight to China’s G-20 assurances. [WSJ]
