Forex news for Asia trading Monday 2 March 2015

Weekend

  • RBA may cut interest rates next week - press
  • Iraq oil minister sees crude price recovering to $64-$65 per barrel
  • China to open up banking sector wider to private firms
  • ECB may begin QE purchases on 9 March
  • China official February PMI - Manufacturing 49.9 (expected 49.7), Non-manufacturing 53.9
  • Germany's Schaeuble: Confident Greece will fulfil bailout conditions
  • Gold - India will introduce gold deposit accounts, and launch a sovereign gold bondWeekend reading: Warren Buffett's annual letter to shareholders
  • More on the surprise Chinese rate cut
  • Markets will be watching for the fallout from Nemtsov killing
  • Varoufakis says loan extension safeguards the Greek financial systemChina cuts benchmark interest rates by 0.25%

Monday

China

  • MNI: China's weekend rate cuts points to official's depth of concern
  • China - HSBC/Markit Manufacturing PMI for February: 50.7 (flash was 50.1)
  • People's Bank of China (PBOC) sets yuan reference rate at 6.1513
  • China State Information Centre: GDP may grow about 7% in Q1
  • Chinese government think tank - economy expected to grow 7% in Q1
  • China Business Herald: China doesn't have condition for massive loosening, stimulus

Australia/New Zealand

  • Citi: Another data point reason for the RBA to cut rates this week
  • RBA to cut rates Tuesday - implications for the Australian dollar (BoA/ Merrill Lynch)
  • Australia - Q4 Company profits: -0.2% (+0.5% expected)
  • Australia - HIA New Home Sales for January, +1.8% (prior was -1.9%)
  • Australia- TD Securities/Melbourne Institute (MI) Inflation Gauge: 0.0% m/m (prior was +0.1%)
  • Australia - AIG Performance of Manufacturing index for February: 45.4 (prior was 49.0)
  • New Zealand - tenth fruit fly found
  • New Zealand terms of trade index for Q4 -1.9% q/q (vs. -3.0% expected)

Japan

  • Economist who picked October BOJ easing says watch out again in April
  • Japan GPIF - target implies 7.2tln yen of equity buying (note - end December data)
  • Japan data - Q4 capital spending + +2.8% y/y (and more data at post)
  • Markit/JMMA Japan manufacturing PMI:51.6 (flash was 51.5 )
  • Wall Street Journal: Fed gearing up for its first rate increase in eight years
  • WSJ Hilsenrath: Federal Reserve ushers in a new era of uncertainty on rates
  • Weekend - Spanish PM Rajoy denies trying to undermine Greece
  • Weekend - French Finance Minister Sapin wants to combat tax fraud

Some decent action to open the week and month.

AUD/USD, to start us off. It opened on its highs in the very early, very illiquid week-beginning New Zealand market, gaining on the news of a Chinese rate cut and a little better manufacturing PMI, also from China. The strength was short-lived, though, as many expected it to be, it fell through 0.7800 in the Sydney morning and spent nearly the entire session steadily losing ground, with minor reactions from 0.7780 and 0.7760. it sits just above the latter as I update.

The NZD, too, was a loser on the session, it too is just above its lows as I write.

USD/JPY spent the session grinding a few points higher, chewing through sellers clustered from 119.80 through to 120.00 ... its been as high as just above 119.95 before settling more or less sideways around 119.85/90.

USd/CHF, too, ticked a little higher, though in a tight range also.

GBP/USD was overall weaker, down below 1.5400. EUR/USD lost ground early but has ticked back a little since the early Tokyo lows.

Oil was pretty much flat all session, Gold a decent performer, gaining around $10 on the day.