Winds of changes in politics inevitably have a profound impact on everyday life and financial markets. And last week was absolutely and unreservedly awful – not price-wise but global security-wise. There was no significant development on the economic front, per se, and our market was also reasonably uneventful, perhaps apart from the brief interruption in oil output at the Johan Sverdrup oil field.
After months of being on missile watch in the Middle East, the oil gaze turns to the airborne show of military new stuffs being exchanged by Ukraine and Russia. After successive days of permission and use of American and British hardware, Russia ups the ante by shooting a ballistic missile which is the first time such a weapon has been used in the 1000-day old war.
My colleague’s view in yesterday’s note seems to have caught the market’s attention. He contemplated that although the outgoing US President allowed Ukraine to use American missiles to strike Russian territories (and so did the UK yesterday), oil installations are most likely off limits.
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