The Weekly Edge: Week-Ahead & Look-Back, Mon 19 – Fri 23 Oct 2026

This week's Weekly Edge covers the look-back for Monday 19 to Friday 23 October 2026 and the look-ahead for Monday 26 to Friday 30 October 2026, across global indices, FX and commodities.

Executive summary

• Equities: AI-led selling, compounded by an oil shock, left most major indices lower. The Nasdaq 100 fell 0.80% and the S&P 500 fell 0.47%, with the Nasdaq Composite having its worst day since June on Thursday. The Hang Seng lost 4.52%, the Nikkei 225 4.01%, the FTSE 100 1.92%, the DAX 1.84% and the CAC 40 2.29%. Rotation cushioned the US: the Dow rose 0.42% and the Russell 2000 1.96%.
• Oil: WTI (December contract) rose 4.29% to $103.27 and Brent to about $116.7, on Houthi attacks on Saudi Arabia and Strait of Hormuz risk.
• Bonds and metals: The US 10-year yield finished just under 5.0%, gold fell 4.14% to about $3,994 (a three-month low) and silver dropped 5.86% to about $53.9.
• FX: The US Dollar Index was flat (-0.03%). AUD/USD led (+1.19%), USD/CAD fell 0.96%, USD/JPY fell 0.74%, EUR/USD slipped 0.34% and GBP/USD rose 0.36%.
• Week ahead: A dense central-bank calendar: the Bank of Canada (Wed, a hike to 2.50% favoured), the Fed (Wed, a hold expected, with focus on December signals), the ECB (Thu, hold expected) and the Bank of Japan (Fri, hold expected). Add the RBNZ and UK Autumn Budget on Wednesday, big-tech earnings, and US Q3 GDP and September PCE on Thursday.

Overall bias: cautious and defensive, with hawkish-surprise risk centred on the Fed, oil and AI earnings.

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Educational only, not financial advice.