On Friday, Donald Trump announced
that the government shutdown was temporarily ending. This brought to an end the
longest shutdown the country has ever seen. However, investors believe that the
government may be shut again as differences between the democrats and
republicans grew. In this round of shutdown, the democrats emerged as the
winner as the president did not get his wall. He will also likely not find his
wall in the ongoing negotiations. This week, investors will know the impacts of
the shutdown to the labor market as the government releases the employment
numbers for January.
Over the weekend, the crisis in
Venezuela continued as the country’s envoy to Washington defected. The envoy
also asked the country’s military to back the leader of the opposition. Last
week, the country’s opposition leader declared himself the president of the
country. Shortly afterwards, he received support from the United States and
other Western countries. The neighboring countries in South America have too
supported him. This isolates Nicholas Maduro, who was recently sworn in. There
is also a lot of pressure on the military to abandon Maduro. However, there is
a possibility that he will remain in power in the foreseeable future as the
military and judiciary continue to support him. This matters because Venezuela
has the biggest oil reserves in the world.
On Sunday, the US government removed
sanctions on Oleg Deripaska, a pro-Putin tycoon who is also one of the largest
producers in the metals market. This happened as the billionaire divested his
stake in the company to below 50%. Also, he will be able to vote 35% of those
shares. He will also be required to replace the board with members approved by
the US treasury and allow the US to see internal documents. The metals market
cheered the easing of sanctions but the US government was criticized by the
democrats who argued that it was very easy on Russia.
Over the weekend, China announced
that it would replace the senior market regulator with another senior banker as
authorities moved to calm the market. In the statement, Yi Huiman, who is the chairman
of Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (ICBC) will take over from Liu Shiyu
as the head of the China Securities Regulatory Commission. ICBC is the
country’s biggest bank by assets and profits. This comes as the country’s
economy continues to experience weakness. Last year, the Shanghai composite
index declined by more than 25%.
Yesterday, a Phillipines church
was hit by terrorists. The attack led to the death of 20 worshipers. ISIS said
it was responsible for the attack. This came two weeks after another attack in
Nairobi left 23 people dead. The recent attacks comes after the Trump
administration announced that it would retreat from its war against Islamic
militia in Syria.
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