Shafaqna English– As Friday(21 Aug 2026) trading commenced across Asian markets, the majority of regional equity indices appeared destined to conclude the week with net losses, primarily because persistent turbulence in global sovereign-debt markets continued to show no meaningful signs of alleviation, while concurrently a protracted diplomatic stalemate among Persian Gulf nations propelled crude-oil benchmarks to their highest valuations in over a month, thereby reinforcing inflationary anxieties as a dominant theme in investor sentiment.
After a surprise intervention by the U.S. Treasury on Wednesday that managed to temporarily halt the bond-market rout for no more than a single day, the upward momentum in Treasury yields swiftly reasserted itself by Friday, as investors resumed their selling pressure and erased the brief reprieve that policymakers had attempted to engineer.
Source: Reuters