Daily summary: European stock markets tumble amid prospects of energy crisis

• European indexes fell sharply on Tuesday, with DAX down 2.91% to a 20-month low below 12,400 mostly due to energy sector problems. 

• Norway has significantly reduced gas and oil exports to European countries. Norwegian workers in the oil and gas sector are on strike and it is estimated that the decline in gas exports could be as high as 50%. 

• Gazprom has reduced gas exports to Europe by 60.0% and in a week's time the annual maintenance of Nordstream I will begin, therefore gas transfer will drop to zero. Russia earns a lot from selling oil, so it cannot be ruled out that the gas transfer will not be resumed.

• Also recent economic data weighed on sentiment: industrial production in France stalled, the French services PMI was revised lower, and there was a broad-based slowdown in services activity, as international demand weakens while costs continue to move higher.

• Both the Dow Jones and the S&P 500 are trading more than 1% lower while the Nasdaq erased early losses and gains 0.50% with energy, materials, industrials and financial sectors being top laggards. 

• News that US President Joe Biden may announce as soon as this week a rollback of some US tariffs on Chinese imports failed to boost investors' confidence, as many economists believe it will not have a big impact on inflation.

• WTI crude futures slumped more than 9% to below $100 per barrel, to the lowest in nearly eight weeks, while Brent futures slid more than 10% to below $102 per barrel.

• Oil sell-off and growth worries weakened commodity currencies and Euro which dropped to 19-year low.

• Gold fell over 2.5% and is approaching support at $1760 per ounce as the US dollar strengthened to levels not seen since 2002. 

• Currently USD and JPY are the best performing major currencies while EUR and CAD lag the most;  

• Despite overall negative sentiment, major cryptocurrencies recorded only slight losses on Tuesday. Bitcoin is trading below $19,700, while Ethereum is testing $1100 level.

Silver fell over 4.0% during today's session and is approaching major support at $18.70, which is marked with lower limit of the 1:1 structure and 61.8% Fibonacci retracement of the upward wave started in March 2020. Source: xStation5