Markets Overview
- ASX SPI 200 futures up 0.2% to 7,298.00
- Dow Average down 0.4% to 34,930.93
- Aussie up 0.2% to 0.7378 per US$
- U.S. 10-year yield fell 1.0bps to 1.2310%
- Australia 3-year bond yield fell 3bps to 0.24%
- Australia 10-year bond yield fell 6bps to 1.15%
- Gold spot up 0.4% to $1,807.15
- Brent futures up 0.3% to $74.67/bbl
Economic Events
- 10:30am: (AU) Australia to Sell A$1.5 Billion 84-Day Bills
- 10:30am: (AU) Australia to Sell A$500 Million 210-Day Bills
- 11:30am: (AU) 2Q Import Price Index QoQ, est. 1.0%, prior 0.2%
- 11:30am: (AU) 2Q Export Price Index QoQ, est. 9.9%, prior 11.2%
Asian stocks look set to rise Thursday after the Federal Reserve said more economic progress is needed to start tapering substantial stimulus and as traders weigh efforts by China to restore market calm there.
Futures rose in Japan, Australia and Hong Kong, where traders are waiting to see if equities will rebound from steep losses sparked by China’s crackdown on private enterprises. The S&P 500 was little changed and the Nasdaq 100 advanced, helped by a rally in Google parent Alphabet Inc. on strong earnings. U.S. equity futures fluctuated in early trading.
Yields on longer-term Treasuries and a gauge of the dollar dipped following the Fed meeting. Fed officials discussed how to go about scaling back bond buying when the time comes, but no decision on timing has been made. Chair Jerome Powell said there was still some way to go to meet the conditions for tapering.
Other News
Prosecutors did not announce who purchased the album, or for how much, but said that the sale covered the balance of the infamous pharmaceutical executive’s court-ordered forfeiture.
A one-of-a-kind album recorded by the Wu-Tang Clan and sold at auction to the disgraced pharmaceutical executive and hedge fund manager Martin Shkreli has been purchased by an anonymous buyer for an undisclosed sum of money, according to the federal prosecutors who seized the album three years ago.
In a news release, Jacquelyn M. Kasulis, the acting United States Attorney for the Eastern District of New York, announced the sale of the one known copy of the album. The terms of the sale required the government to keep the purchase price and the buyer secret, but the sale satisfied the balance that Mr. Shkreli had owed the government, according to the news release.
The unique album — more akin to a piece of fine art than a standard record — was seized by the government in 2018 after a judge said that it could be used to pay part of the $7.36 million that Mr. Shkreli owed.
Mr. Shkreli’s lawyer, Brianne E. Murphy, said she had no information related to the buyer or the price, but said that she was happy that Mr. Shkreli had satisfied his forfeiture balance and was “closing this chapter.”
Mr. Shkreli became famous in 2015, when he boosted the price of a drug used to treat a rare disease by 5,000 percent overnight through his company, Turing Pharmaceuticals.
Instead of recoiling from the negative attention he received after the price hike, he leaned into it, drawing an enormous amount of negative attention. (Donald J. Trump, then a presidential candidate, said, “He looks like a spoiled brat to me.”)
In December of that year, Bloomberg Business reported that Mr. Shkreli had purchased the sought-after album at auction for $2 million.
Two years later, Mr. Shkreli was convicted of fraud in connection with two hedge funds he ran, MSMB Capital and MSMB Healthcare, as well as conspiracy to commit securities fraud. The following year, he was sentenced to seven years in prison.
