Global Investors Hold Breath as Turkey Sucks Air From Risk Rally
- A risk-on week ends in doubt as army attempts government coup
- ‘The market can get things wrong pretty fast,’ an analyst says
Shops are closed at Kizilay district of central Ankara on July 16.
Photographer: Erhan Ortac/Getty ImagesThis article is for subscribers only.
An encouraging week for global investors ended in anxiety as an attempted coup in Turkey thrust geopolitical tensions back to the fore, blindsiding bulls preparing to celebrate rallies from Tokyo to New York.
News that army officers were attempting to seize power came just in time to push U.S. equity futures lower in the last minutes of trading, flatten an exchange-traded fund tracking Turkish shares and send the lira to the worst drop in eight years. The sucker punch followed a week in which the S&P 500 Index broke through to records after a 13-month hiatus and global stocks jumped to an eight-month high.