Early morning, outbreak, 11 circuit breakers!

The three major U.S. stock indices opened lower and continued to decline, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average falling more than 330 points, and both the Nasdaq and S&P 500 indices down over 1%. Large technology stocks all fell, with Tesla down nearly 5%, Nvidia down over 2%, and Microsoft, Google-C, Amazon, and Apple all down over 1%. META saw a slight decline, and the market value of the U.S. 'seven sisters' evaporated by $335 billion overnight (approximately 2.44 trillion yuan).

In terms of individual stocks, cybersecurity company INTRUSION triggered 11 circuit breakers during trading, closing up 380%, with a turnover rate exceeding 2200%.

Yellen: The Treasury will reach a new debt ceiling in mid-January.

On December 27 local time, the official website of the U.S. Treasury announced that Yellen sent a letter to the leaders of the Republican and Democratic parties in both the House and Senate regarding the debt ceiling issue.

The content of the letter released by the Treasury shows that Yellen informed lawmakers that the bill passed last June temporarily suspended the effectiveness of the debt ceiling, with the suspension set to expire on January 1, 2025. Therefore, starting January 2, 2025, the debt ceiling will restore its enforcement on all statutory unpaid debts as of January 1.

Yellen stated that it is expected that the unpaid statutory debt subject to the debt ceiling will decrease by about $54 billion on January 2, primarily due to a planned redemption of non-tradable securities held by federal trust funds related to Medicare payments. Therefore, the Treasury will not need to take special measures to prevent a U.S. debt default starting January 2.

Yellen indicated that the Treasury currently expects to reach a new (debt) ceiling between January 14 and January 23, at which point the Treasury will need to begin taking extraordinary measures.

At the end of the letter, Yellen urged Congress to take action to address the debt ceiling issue and protect the credibility of the U.S. abroad.

International gold prices fell slightly.

In the commodity market, spot gold fell by 0.43%, priced at $2621.348 per ounce; COMEX gold futures fell by 0.66%, priced at $2636.5 per ounce.

International oil prices rose, with ICE Brent crude up 1.15% and NYMEX WTI crude up 0.92%.

Analysts say the rise in oil prices is due to increased optimism in the market regarding global economic recovery, especially with a positive outlook on economic data from major economies such as the U.S., China, and Europe, which has raised expectations for future growth in oil demand.