Market Today

Today's market outlook comes early (cos I'll going out for my Friday nite party!)
Anyway, here's the juice for your post-dinner digestion (or indigestion):

In London, the FTSE 100 index of leading shares closed 8 points lower, at 6,440, yesterday. Now at 6,490, it has regained some 50 points.On the Continent, the Paris CAC-40 is currently at 5,906, up 77 points from yesterday. Frankfurt's DAX-30 was lifted to 7,338, intraday. Not bad for a day's job.
Across the Atlantic, stocks closed mixed as the pharmaceutical and biotech sectors made gains whilst oil majors and metals miners fell. The Dow Jones industrial index recovered from a morning slump to achieve a new record closing high of 12,808, a 4-point gain. The Nasdaq lost 5 points, ending the day at 2,505. And the S&P 500 lost one point to close at 1,470.
In Asia, buyers cautiously returned to the Nikkei following yesterday's losses, helping the Tokyo index to a close of 17,452, an 80-point gain. In Hong Kong, the Hang Seng added 234 points to close at 20,534. STI picked up another 69 points to close at 3,360, just 40 points down from yesterday. KLSE, the only laggard of the day, seems to be the only counter that might end the day in the negative saw itself jump right back on track to 1,315, up just 9 points from yesterday's close. So no red today in Asia.
Crude oil was 52 cents higher at $62.35 this morning, and Brent spot had edged up to $65.79 in London.
Spot gold lurched between an 11-month high of $691.50 and a low of $678.70 yesterday, and was trading at $684.70 this morning. Silver had climbed to $13.73.

So what's going on?

A shiver went through global stock markets briefly yesterday as China’s economic growth once again stormed in ahead of expectations, at 11.1% in the first quarter, leading premier Wen Jiabao to announce plans for a further crackdown on lending.
The Shanghai Shenzhen index fell 4.5%. Mr Wen felt that loan growth is too fast. Fact is: Inflation is now at 3.3%, the fastest rate in two years, and money is still being piled into building industrial infrastructure that no one really needs. Meanwhile, millions of Chinese are opening trading accounts & diving into the stock market, as a rampant case of genuine casino capitalism overtakes the populace.
You don’t have to belong to the Austrian School of Economics to know that this mad levels of investment, especially when orchestrated by commissars for political purposes, invariably end badly.
Part of the problem is that the Chinese currency, the yuan, remains artificially cheap. All the money flowing into the country is fuelling the boom. Some felt that the regime should “bite the bullet now” on yuan revaluation. Of course this would lead to carnage in the countryside as farmers would go bankrupt in the face of cheap grain imports.
This is probably the reason that the chinese government is trying to find other ways to slow the damaging growth in its investment bubble, such as tightening lending requirements. But if you keep trying to put off the tough choices until tomorrow, the problem you‘re attempting to escape just gets larger and larger, Mr Wen.
Of course, you have a choice, Mr Wen. Other countries don’t even have the option of setting their own rates.

So, how is your stomach now?

Until Monday, have a great weekend.
And remember: Don't do what I Won't Do.