Global stocks fell for a third day, while the dollar and Treasuries rose, after Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak defied calls for his resignation and corporate earnings disappointed investors.
The MSCI World Index lost 0.5 percent at 9:32 a.m. in New York and the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index slipped 0.3 percent, paring a second straight weekly gain. The dollar strengthened 15 of 16 of its most-traded peers, while the yield on the 10-year Treasury note slipped six basis points to 3.65 percent. The cost of insuring Egypt’s debt against default jumped the most in more than a week.
Mubarak handed day-to-day powers to Vice President Omar Suleiman while reiterating plans to stay on until elections in September, prompting U.S. President Barack Obama to urge Egyptian authorities to take further steps to resolve the crisis. The number of companies beating earnings estimates has slowed, with 56 percent of the firms in the MSCI World that have reported fourth-quarter results since Jan. 10 topping projections, down from 61 percent in the previous quarter.
“These latest developments in Egypt will be negative on sentiment for the market,” Kelvin Tay, Singapore-based chief investment strategist for UBS Wealth Management, said in a Bloomberg Television interview.
