Bangkok — Stocks in Europe and Asia mostly fell amid thin holiday trading as China held military exercises near the island of Taiwan.
Gold and silver prices fell after recent gains, while oil prices jumped more than $1. US futures were little changed.
Shares in Taiwan were even higher after that China military It said it was conducting the exercises around the autonomous island, which Beijing claims as its territory.
In early European trade, Germany’s DAX fell 0.2% to 24,296.81, while the CAC 40 in Paris remained almost unchanged at 8,100.83. Likewise, Britain’s FTSE 100 index barely budged at 9,874.80 points.
The future for S&The P 500 Index fell 0.2% while the Dow Jones Industrial Average was flat.
China said that its joint forces’ exercises aimed to warn against what it described as separatist forces and “external interference.” Taiwan put its army on alert and described the Beijing government as “the greatest destroyer of peace.”
Training came next Beijing expressed its anger at US arms sales To the territory. This came after a comment from the Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaishi that It is possible that the Japanese Defense Forces could intervene if China takes action against Taiwan. The Chinese statement did not mention the United States and Japan.
Taiwan’s Taiex rose 0.9%, but Hong Kong’s Hang Seng gave up early gains, falling 0.7% to 25,635.23. The Shanghai Composite Index was virtually unchanged at 3,965.28.
The Nikkei 225 index in Tokyo fell by 0.4% to 50,526.92 points.
In South Korea, the KOSPI index jumped 2.2% to 4,220.56, less than two points from the all-time record set in early November. SK Hynix’s 6.8% jump due to a regulatory change that led to the lifting of an investment warning for its shares helped boost the index. Samsung Electronics shares advanced 2.1%.
Australia S&The P/ASX 200 index fell 0.4% to 8,725.70.
The price of gold fell by 1.3% to $4,494 per ounce, while silver fell by 2.3% to $75.40. It has surged to record levels due to supply constraints, with both precious metals favored by investors seeking safe havens outside stocks and bonds.
Previous rises in gold prices also partly reflected concerns during the US government shutdown. Expectations have increased that the US Federal Reserve will cut interest rates further in the new year, weakening the dollar against other currencies. Buy gold.
Silver, which like gold is used in many industries, was affected by other factors as well. China, which refines about two-thirds of global supplies, abolished its export quota system and replaced it with an export licensing system as of January 1.
“Scarcity is no longer theoretical,” Stephen Innes of SPI Asset Management said in a report. “China is at the center of global silver refining, and when the world’s largest silver refining company starts tightening the valve, downstream users feel it immediately.”
Reopening on Friday from Christmas vacationS&The P 500 index fell less than 0.1%, and the Dow Jones Industrial Average also fell less than 0.1%. The Nasdaq Composite Index fell 0.1%.
With three trading days left in 2025, S&The P 500 rose almost 18% this yearThis has been helped by the Trump administration’s deregulation policies and investor optimism about the future of artificial intelligence.
Trading was light, with institutional investors largely closed out for the year.
In other trading early Monday, the price of U.S. crude oil rose $1.13 to $57.87 a barrel, while the price of Brent crude, the international standard, rose $1.13 to $61.37 a barrel. On Friday, American crude fell by 2.8%, and Brent crude fell by 2.6%.
The US dollar fell to 156.30 Japanese yen from 156.56 yen. The euro rose to $1.1779 from $1.1770.