External background.
On Thursday, U.S. stocks showed widespread declines across all three major indexes. The Dow index fell the most noticeably – by 1.3%, while the S&P 500 fell by 0.8% and the Nasdaq by 0.7%. The decline continued after the Nasdaq's sharpest daily drop since December 2022. In general, sales were widespread, and the volatility index (fear) rose to May highs. We note the second consecutive decline in the Russell 2000 index of small companies. There was also data on unemployment claims, which turned out to be higher than analysts' expectations. The European Stoxx 600 index fell for the fourth day in a row, yesterday the index fell by another 0.2% amid continued sales of technology stocks. The ECB kept the rate at the same level yesterday, as expected, but the head of the ECB did not give specific forecasts for a rate cut in September, which the market is now waiting for. Asian markets have been mostly showing declines since the morning, following the rest of the world. Hong Kong's Hang Seng index is down 1.9% and Korea's Kospi index is down 1%, while Japan's Nikkei 225 is down 0.2%. Oil prices fell by 0.4%, and copper dropped sharply in price by 2.9%.
Bonds.
The US 10-year yield rose slightly from 4.16% to 4.20% on Thursday.
The KASE index.
The KASE index fell 0.7% on Thursday, losing all Wednesday's growth. All index securities except KEGOC, which grew by only 1 tenge, showed a decrease. Nevertheless, the index continues to be in a local sideways trend.
Index shares.
The main decline (-3.3%) was shown yesterday by Air Astana shares, falling for the ninth trading day in a row. Quotes have updated new lows, which now amounts to KZT 801 per share. GDR also fell in price by 3.3% yesterday. There was no news for the decline. It should be noted that the financial report for the first half of the year will be released very soon: on August 1. This event may become a factor for recovery, given that the overall air passenger transportation market grew by 15% YoY. Kazatomprom shares also declined more noticeably than the rest (-0.7%), which in principle was not a big surprise, given the large premium in the price of shares relative to the GDR. Kaspi.kz on Nasdaq, despite the falling broad US market, it showed growth and once again updated historical highs. The main news for the issuer will be the release of the financial report next Monday. The "hold" recommendation is still relevant after the local goal has been achieved. Kazakhtelecom shares continued to move in a local sideways trend, which may be broken down in the coming days, and then the quotes will gradually decrease towards 38,000 tenge.
Currency.
Yesterday, the dollar continued to rise for the third day in a row. This time, the exchange rate increased quite noticeably – to 478.97 tenge. Despite this, we believe that leaving well above 480 tenge per $1 is unlikely.