Leaving interest rates unchanged by the FOMC increased investors’ fear about the global economy. Still persistent uncertainty had a negative impact on the behaviour of stock markets last week. Admittedly, most of stock exchanges started the week quite positively. But later it turned out that it was only a temporary stop ahead of further declines. Then Friday brought an improvement in investor sentiment. It was mainly due to Janet Yellen's Thursday speech, whose words sounded hawkish.

The FOMC's two-day meeting and the decision concerning interest rates in the United States were last week’s major events. The Federal Reserve left interest rates unchanged. Although analysts were divided in opinion on the decision, the majority expected just such scenario. In the statement after the meeting the Fed said that they expect further improvement in the labour market. They pointed out the negative developments in the global economy, which have taken place recently. It is mainly about the Chinese economy condition and bearish oil prices.

In comparison to major European markets the WSE was not bad at all in the past week. The main Polish indices were still making up for previous weeks’ losses. The banking sector performed very well. This was in response to the information that there is no chance the lower house of the Polish parliament will pass the foreign currency mortgage loans law. As a consequence, the market went up considerably during Thursday's trading session.

Last week was quite a rich in economic data. Furthermore earnings season of companies listed on the WSE ended up and as usual the last day was full of publications. However, the past week was not a successful one for investors in Europe as well as across the Atlantic.

Last week all stock indices which matter on global financial markets faced a strong volatility increase. To illustrate the situation we can call it a rollercoaster. Monday’s plunge was caused by surprisingly strong negative local stock exchanges reaction to the weak China manufacturing PMI. In two days the Shanghai Composite index shed 15%, and in the week ended 28th August the Shanghai Stock Exchange dropped 8%.