Western countries have redoubled their efforts to limit Russia's ability to do business.
< p>Asian markets recovered on Friday, Feb. 25 after Wall Street's surprise reversal the day before. Investors weighed the long-term consequences of tough Western sanctions against Russia after it brought down troops, tanks and missiles on Ukraine, reports the Chronicle.info with reference to RBC-Ukraine.
European stock markets look set to follow Asia in gains even as Russia continues its attacks.
Some analysts said sanctions from the US, Europe and a number of other countries were not as strong as they feared markets.
While Western countries have redoubled their efforts to limit Russia's ability to do business by freezing banking assets and shutting down state-owned enterprises, they have not cut Russia off from the SWIFT international banking system or targeted its oil and gas exports, which some analysts say , helped markets recover.
«The limits of the economic pain that the West was willing to endure in order to support Ukraine and punish Russia were revealed within 24 hours of the start of the Russian offensive», — ; OANDA senior market analyst Geoffrey Halley said in a note.
According to him, «the Russian offensive came at a time of already high inflation and a shortage of goods in the world, and the West immediately blinked»
Investors regained their risk appetite yesterday after some initial sharp losses, with major US indexes gaining led by tech stocks. The Dow Jones rose 0.28% on Thursday.
But some analysts fear that any gains may be fleeting.
«Biden's sanctions and the reluctance to send troops bring some relief. But this conflict will be protracted and will increase global inflationary pressures, which will force central banks to tighten measures», — said Kyle Rodda, an analyst at IG Markets in Melbourne.
According to him, «for now everything is fine, but in the long term the market will move down».
Oil prices rose again on supply disruption concerns, with Brent crude up 2% to $101.80 a barrel and U.S. WTI also up 2.71% to $95.53. although both benchmarks were below their highs.
Gold rose 0.57% to $1,913 an ounce after falling from a multi-month high of $1,973.96 hit Thursday.
The 10-year US Treasury yielded 1.95% after an initial decline to 1.84% on Thursday, the biggest daily drop since the end of November.
The US dollar index, which measures the US dollar against a basket of major currencies, fell 0.23% to 96 .87, rising on Thursday to levels last seen during the first wave of the coronavirus pandemic. The Russian ruble rose again to 85.52 against the dollar, rebounding from a record low of 89.98. Meanwhile, trading in securities has been suspended on the Moscow Exchange today.
Recall that the United States, in response to Russia's armed aggression against Ukraine, imposed sanctions against Russia's largest banks — «Sberbank» and «VTB». In addition, the entourage of Russian President Vladimir Putin fell under restrictive measures.