European stocks open sharply lower! Gold plummets, silver crashes

On March 19, Asian-Pacific stock markets collectively declined, with the Nikkei 225 down 3.38%, the Korea Composite Index down 2.73%, and the Australian S&P/ASX 200 and New Zealand S&P/NZX 50 indices falling nearly 2%.

European major stock indices also opened lower, with Germany’s DAX, the UK’s FTSE 100, and France’s CAC 40 all dropping over 1%.

Spot gold plunged sharply, touching a low of $4,696.0 per ounce, breaking below the $4,700 level, with intraday declines exceeding 2%. Currently, it’s down 2.07%, at $4,714.1 per ounce. Spot silver’s intraday decline expanded to 7%, breaking below $70 per ounce.

In the A-share market, both major indices tumbled significantly, with the Shanghai Composite falling over 1% and briefly losing the 4,000-point mark during the day, while the Shenzhen Component Index dropped over 2%. Hong Kong stocks also declined, with the Hang Seng Index and Hang Seng Tech Index both down over 2%, and southbound capital net buying exceeding HKD 26 billion.

Specifically, during the trading session, stock indices fluctuated and declined rapidly towards the close. The Shanghai Index once fell below 4,000 points, and the Shenzhen and STAR Market indices declined over 2%. By the close, the Shanghai Composite was down 1.39% at 4,006.55 points, the Shenzhen Component Index down 2.02%, the ChiNext Index down 1.11%, and the STAR Market Index down 2.3%. The combined turnover of Shanghai, Shenzhen, and Beijing markets was approximately 21.3 trillion yuan, an increase of about 660 billion yuan from the previous day.

Over 4,900 stocks in the A-share market were in the red, with the largest declines in the non-ferrous metals, steel, and chemical sectors. Recently, Sanfangxiang, which hit the daily limit four days in a row, fell to the limit during trading. Anyang Steel dropped nearly 9%. Conversely, gas and oil sectors rose against the trend, with Tianhao Energy (300332) hitting a 20% daily limit in the afternoon, Kaicai Gas rising nearly 20%, and Shouhua Gas up nearly 14%. The coal sector also gained, with Shaanxi Black Cat hitting the daily limit, China Shenhua rising over 4%, and other coal companies up over 3%.

Oil and gas sectors surged

The oil sector saw strong gains during the session. By the close, Shouhua Gas rose nearly 14%, Blue Flame Holdings hit the daily limit, and Tongyuan Petroleum and Keli Shares rose over 8%. China National Offshore Oil Corporation (CNOOC) and China Petroleum & Chemical Corporation (Sinopec) both increased over 5%.

Gas sector also advanced, with Tianhao Energy up 20%, Kaicai Gas nearly 20%, Hongtong Gas, and Guoxin New Energy hitting the daily limit.

Amid concerns over escalating Middle East conflicts, international oil prices surged sharply during the day, with May Brent crude futures briefly surpassing $110 per barrel.

According to CCTV Finance, on the 18th, Israel’s military attacked Iran’s “largest natural gas facility” in Bushehr, southern Iran, which processes 40% of Iran’s natural gas.

Early on the 19th, Qatar’s Ras Laffan gas facility was hit again by missiles. Earlier that day, Iran claimed it had attacked oil facilities in Gulf countries hosting Iranian enemies. Ras Laffan Industrial City is the world’s largest liquefied natural gas (LNG) production site.

Additionally, Xinhua News Agency reported that the UAE’s Abu Dhabi Media Office confirmed on the 19th that fragments from intercepted missiles fell on the Habshan natural gas facility and Bab oil field, affecting both. The Habshan gas facility has been temporarily shut down.

Citigroup analysts believe Brent crude could rise to $120 per barrel in the coming days. If energy infrastructure suffers widespread attacks or the Strait of Hormuz remains closed for an extended period, the average price of Brent crude in Q2 and Q3 could reach $130 per barrel.

Coal sector also performed strongly, with Shaanxi Black Cat hitting the daily limit, Dayou Energy and China Shenhua rising over 4%, and Shaanxi Coal Industry, Yankuang Energy, and China Coal Energy up over 3%.

Institutions note that geopolitical conflicts between the US, Israel, and Iran have triggered rapid rises in international oil, gas, and chemical prices. Coupled with adjustments in Indonesian coal quotas and export policies, international coal prices have also increased. These events have heightened market focus on energy security and inflation, driving the overall energy sector higher.

Computing power sector active again

The concept of computing power saw renewed activity, with the close seeing Copper Cow Information hit a new high of 20%, Hongjing Technology up over 13%, and intraday gains exceeding 18% to new highs. Jiechuan Intelligent rose over 10%, and companies like Meili Yun and Litong Electronics hit the daily limit.

Industry-wise, as AI applications become more widespread and OpenClaw gains popularity, the market for computing services is entering a price increase cycle. Major cloud service providers like Alibaba Cloud, Tencent Cloud, Baidu Cloud, and others have announced price hikes for AI computing power and related services. Since the start of the year, overseas cloud providers have also raised prices for core products. On January 22, Amazon announced a 15% price increase for EC2 instances used for large model training. On January 27, Google Cloud announced price increases for data transfer, AI, and computing infrastructure services, with increases up to 100%.

Institutions believe that the wave driven by OpenClaw has pushed the AI agent concept to the brink of large-scale application, redefining human-computer interaction and forcing upgrades in security systems. Its high demand for reasoning tokens further boosts the growth of the AI industry chain’s computing power.

Open-source securities believe that the open-source AI assistant OpenClaw has launched a new agent paradigm, becoming a focus for major domestic cloud providers like Tencent Cloud, Alibaba Cloud, Huawei Cloud, Tianyi Cloud, China Mobile Cloud, JD Cloud, Volcano Engine, and Baidu Cloud, all supporting it. OpenClaw continues to perform tasks such as coding, debugging, tool invocation, file reading, and iteration. Token consumption has shifted from “human-machine dialogue” to “machine self-loop,” with each task potentially consuming hundreds of thousands or millions of tokens, driving massive demand for computing power.