WEEKLY MARKET REVIEW

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Get the latest insights on global financial markets with our Weekly Market Review. In it we discuss the key financial headlines from the U.S, Europe, UK, Ireland, and Asia-Pacific, along with in-depth analysis of major asset classes, including:

Equities – U.S, Europe, and UK market trends
Bonds – Interest rate movements and fixed-income insights
Commodities – Oil, gold, and other key market drivers

Stay ahead of market trends with our expert insights. Read the latest update now!

Weekly Market Review: 28th September 2026

The Week in Numbers

Equity Markets

Equity Indices	Value	Weekly Change	YTD Change
S&P 500	7,743.41	+0.66%	+12.90%
NASDAQ	27,068.72	+1.29%	+16.50%
EuroStoxx50	6,302.82	+0.95%	+7.73%
EuroStoxx600	638.65	+0.39%	+7.13%
FTSE 100	10,695.25	+0.34%	+7.48%
ISEQ	14,384.24	+0.71%	+9.81%

Central Bank Interest Rates

Interest Rate	Current Rate	Direction	Rate Change
FED	4.00%	—	0
ECB	2.65%	—	0
BOE	3.75%	—	0

Government Bonds

Fixed Income	Yield	Weekly Change	YTD Change
US 10YR	5.167	+3.42%	+24.42%
US 2YR	4.864	+2.55%	+40.21%
German 10YR	3.6210	+2.82%	+26.51%
UK 10YR	5.3593	+1.42%	+19.79%
Irish 10YR	3.684	+1.93%	+21.66%

Foreign Exchange Currency Movements

FX	Value	Weekly Change	YTD Change
EUR/USD	1.139	-0.79%	-3.01%
EUR/GBP	0.859	+0.34%	-1.40%
GBP/USD	1.324	-1.04%	-1.66%

Key Events

30/09/2026 – US Core PCE Inflation data
02/10/2026 – US Non Farm Payrolls

Stay Informed with Our Seaspray Private Weekly Financial Market Review

Equities – U.S, Europe, and UK market trends
Bonds – Interest rate movements and fixed-income insights
Commodities – Oil, gold, and other key market drivers

Stay ahead of market trends with our expert insights. Read the latest update now!

FINANCIAL HEADLINES

United States

It was a significant week for US foreign relations, as President Trump addressed the United Nations General Assembly and welcomed Chinese President Xi Jinping to the US for the first time in a decade. On the sidelines of the UN, US envoys held talks with members of Iran’s delegation, the first such talks since June, and further discussions are expected shortly. Following President Xi’s arrival in Washington, it was announced that the trade truce between the two countries, agreed in the wake of the trade war sparked by US tariffs, would be extended until 10 January 2027.

In US corporate news, Paramount has cleared the way for its acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery after reaching settlements with 12 states that had sued to block the $110bn deal, which was first agreed in February. Paramount beat Netflix in an intense bidding war for the storied Hollywood studio.

Europe & UK

In Europe, there was a notable change to the Euro Stoxx 50 last week, as Volkswagen, once Europe’s most valuable company by market capitalisation, left the eurozone’s leading blue-chip index after 15 years. The removal comes as Volkswagen continues to restructure, with the carmaker seeking to counter the rise of lower-cost Chinese rivals and tightening margins across the automotive sector. Following Volkswagen’s exit, Ferrari, BMW and Mercedes-Benz are the only carmakers left in the index. Interestingly, VW is being replaced by Nokia, whose fortunes have been revived by demand linked to AI and data centres.

In the UK, consumers continued to increase their spending in August despite higher prices, although fuel sales fell. Retail sales rose 0.5% on the month, reversing the 0.5% contraction recorded in July and were 2.4% higher than in August 2025.

Ireland

Last week, AIB raised €750mn through its tenth green bond issue. Proceeds from this latest bond issuance will go to fund projects with a positive environmental and climate impact, including renewable energy, clean transport, the circular economy and waste management. The orderbook peaked at €2.2bn, almost three times the amount raised, reflecting strong investor demand, and the bond priced with a coupon of 4.125%. Since launching its green bond programme in 2020, AIB has raised €7.2bn.

Asia-Pacific

China has spent a record amount on gold imports so far in 2026 as it seeks to build its holdings of the precious metal for both domestic and geopolitical reasons. Since January, China has spent $158bn importing more than 1,000 tonnes of gold, already well above the $96.5bn spent on 886 tonnes in the whole of 2025. Much of the increase in spending reflects higher prices. Gold reached record highs above $5,000 an ounce early in the year, before falling back to the low $4,000s. China is also the largest producer of gold bullion, despite not having the largest reserves of the metal, with Australia and Russia having the largest recorded reserves.

Chinese investors and the state have increasingly turned to gold as a long-term store of wealth and an alternative to domestic assets. China’s property market remains depressed, its equity markets lag behind many international peers, and bond yields are at record lows. Against this backdrop, gold offers both a hedge and the potential for real returns.

ASSET CLASS REVIEW

Equities

In the United States, artificial intelligence drove a strong start to the week before oil and the prospect of further Federal Reserve increases took some of it back. On Monday chipmakers led a broad rally: AMD rose almost 10% to join the group of companies valued at more than $1 trillion, Arm Holdings gained 17% and Meta more than 11%, and the NASDAQ closed at a record high. Comments from President Trump that he was open to meeting Iran’s president coincided with a fall in crude prices that also helped. The NASDAQ set a second record on Tuesday as Micron added 5%, although financial shares slipped. The mood changed on Wednesday, when Iran said it would not yield to American pressure, oil jumped and strong business surveys lifted the odds of another rate increase in October; Alphabet fell 3.8% and Amazon 2.2%. Meta unveiled a new handheld device last week, which will be linked to the company’s new AI agent, Muse. The Muse Charm will be able to fit onto a keychain and will be activated by a fingerprint sensor. It will also have real time voice interactivity and is being pitched as an alternative to the company’s AI enabled sunglasses. For the week, the S&P 500 and NASDAQ closed +0.66% and +1.29% higher, respectively.

In Europe, shares followed the price of oil. Monday brought the largest one-day gain for the region since early July, led by banks and technology, while Novo Nordisk lost 7.7% after its investor day. The advance faded from Wednesday as crude oil climbed back above $100: energy was the only major sector to rise that day, while insurers and construction companies fell. In corporates, a Finnish steelmaker announced last week it had found a new way to extract chrome, which is a critical mineral used in the jet engines and gas turbines. Outokumpu, the operator of Europe’s only chrome mine, said its technology was now able to create a purer form of chrome with near zero emissions, using sulphur to split chromium and iron oxides. For the week, the Euro Stoxx 50 and STOXX Europe 600 closed +0.95% and +0.39% higher, respectively.

In the United Kingdom, the FTSE100 index spent the week recovering part of the previous Friday’s fall. Banks led on Monday, with Barclays and HSBC higher, while the drop in crude oil prices weighed on BP and Shell. However, as oil strengthened towards the later part of the week, shares in both companies bounced back. Kingfisher jumped 12% on Tuesday after raising its profit outlook and Smiths rose 7.5%, although BT’s 3.8% fall kept the index in check, and energy gains offset weakness elsewhere on Wednesday. For the week, the FTSE 100 closed +0.34% higher.

Bonds

American government borrowing costs climbed to fresh highs. The ten-year treasury yield slipped below 5% early in the week as oil fell, then surged to 5.188% by Thursday, and the thirty-year reached its highest level since 2004. Strong business surveys, jobless claims of 197,000 and a series of Federal Reserve speakers pointing to further increases drove the move, lifting the two-year yield to around 4.9%. British gilts followed the same global pattern, with the ten-year yield around 5.3% on Thursday, while an overshoot in August borrowing added to the fiscal backdrop ahead of the autumn budget.

Commodities

Oil fell for the first half of the week and then recovered all of the loss. Brent dipped below $100 a barrel on Tuesday for the first time in several weeks as Saudi shipments through the Strait of Hormuz rose to around 2.9 million barrels a day, up from about 0.7 million in August, and a major Saudi pipeline restarted. The reversal came on Wednesday, when Iran said it would not give way to American pressure and diplomatic contacts at the United Nations made little headway, lifting Brent back to about $105 by Thursday, broadly unchanged over the week.

Gold fell around 1.4% to about $4,280 an ounce, close to a one-week low. A firmer dollar and rising market expectations of further Federal Reserve rate hikes weighed on the precious metal.

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