- Gold on approach to its Friday lows
- RBA monetary policy meeting Tuesday 5 March -
- Evergrande will escape having to demolish 39 buildings. They'll be confiscated instead.
- One of Japan's PM Kishida's close aides has defended BOJ ultra-loose monetary policy
- Australia ANZ job ads in March March +0.4% m/m (prior 10.9% in February)
- Australia, monthly inflation gauge (March): Headline inflation: +0.8% m/m to 4.0% y/y
- Weekend - China moved to improve cooperation with the US on company listing issues
- 2000 members of China's People Liberation Army sent to Shanghai to assist with COVID-19
- China COVID-19 - Shanghai reports a record high number of cases
- Senior China Communist Party official reiterates unswerving adherence to zero policy
- Bank of England speakers on the agenda for Monday 04 April 2022 - Bailey, Cuncliffe
- Reserve Bank of Australia monetary policy meeting this week - "non event"
- Ukraine update - accusations of Russian war crimes, torture and killings of civilians.
- Exxon provides natural gas to power crypto mining, looks at expanding the program globally
- Trade ideas thread - Monday 04 April 2022
- ECB's Schnabel affirmed the Bank would hike rates but was cagey on timing
- Iran’s Foreign Minister says agreement in Vienna nuclear talks ‘close’
- China has found a new variant of COVID-19.
- Daly says the case for a 50bp Federal Reserve rate hike has 'grown'
- US Sec State Blinken: Ruble rebound fuelled by “a lot of manipulation”, not sustainable
- Monday morning open levels - indicative forex prices - 04 April 2022
- The monthly oil chart leaves an ominous signal
- New York Fed President Williams says balance sheet runoff could start next month
- We continue to like fading USD/CAD rallies for downside In Q2 - BofA
- NZD to outperform AUD ahead of next week's RBA meeting - Barclays
We had comments from a couple of Federal Reserve officials over the weekend, Williams and Daly. Williams indicated balance sheet reduction could begin next month (the next Federal Open Market Committee meeting is May 3 and 4) while Daly backed the prospect of a 50bp rate hike at the May meeting (and likely more to come).
It was a holiday in China today (and is again tomorrow) but there was a steady drip-feed of news out of the country as coronavirus outbreaks worsened and the lockdown in Shanghai intensified. Chinese officials once again reiterated that the ‘zero’ policy remains in place with no plans for an exit. Medical personnel are flooding into Shanghai to assist in efforts to combat the spread, including 2000+ from the People’s Liberation Army.
Also from China, over the weekend we had an announcement from the China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC) removing a legal hurdle to greater cooperation with US authorities on auditing Chinese listed firms in the US. More in the bullets above. This should be a positive input for Chinese equities (which reopen for trade on Wednesday after the holidays) and indeed stocks in Hong Kong gained on the session today (ps. HK markets are closed for a holiday Tuesday. And also ps., HK CEO Carrie Lam announced today she would not be seeking a 2nd term when her current term expires).
Across FX, moves were fairly limited. USD/JPY began by dropping 40 or so points but has since recovered all of this. EUR/USD is up just a few tics on the session. The EU is mulling tighter sanctions on Russia re its war on, and war crimes in, Ukraine. AUD, NZD, and CAD all gained some points against the dollar. Oil and gold lost some ground. Oil has managed to trace much of its small slide.
Bitcoin popped above US$47K on Monday morning time in Asia but quickly turned around to drop back under $46K. Its above $46k as I post.
