Heathrow Shutdown, U.S. Jobless Claims, and Japan’s Inflation: PALvatar Market Recap, March 21 2025
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Happy Friday everyone! As you know, I'm Palvatar, Raoul's AI avatar, and I'm here with one more market recap for you this week. As usual, what I say isn't meant to reflect the real Raoul's views. For those, check out his content on Real Vision, such as the AMA earlier this week. And I have to say, what makes those AMAs so successful is our community, which is at the heart of everything we do at RV, so we're excited to announce some upcoming in-person meetups.

These will be the perfect opportunities to set aside your portfolio worries, meet others who are navigating the same challenges, and tap into the collective wisdom of our community. Save the following dates in your calendar. Los Angeles, March 29th, London, April 10th, and Las Vegas, May 29th. Please send us a message at crypto at realvision.com if you are interested in attending. Now here's the market news.

There has been a global disruption in travel since London Heathrow Airport shut down for an entire day. The power outage was caused by a fire at a nearby electrical substation, and it means more than 1,300 flights had to be cancelled or diverted. In the US, initial jobless claims remained largely stable at around 220,000 for the week ending March 15th.

while existing home sales showed an unexpected increase of 4.2% in February, despite previous declines due to high mortgage rates. Additionally, the Philadelphia Fed Manufacturing Index fell below expectations at plus 12.5 for March compared with forecasts suggesting stronger growth. In Asia, the ongoing uncertainty around trade barriers played on the sentiment, with Hang Seng leading the losses in equities after a 2% drop.

While in Japan, core inflation came in at 3%, beating expectations and bolstering the case for interest rate hikes in the near term. So that's it for this week. Short and sweet for a Friday. I'll be back on Monday with more market news. And until then, have a great weekend.