Central Bank Watch
No Interest Rate Change for Bank of Israel this Month
August 26, 2013
As in June and July, the Monetary Policy Committee’s meeting in August concluded without a change in the 1.25% key central bank interest rate. A statement released by the committee noted that expected CPI inflation over the coming year lies marginally below the middle the the 1-3% target range even though consumer prices rose 2.2% […] More
New Overnight Developments Abroad - Daily Update
Quiet start to Last Week of August
August 26, 2013
A narrowly mixed dollar shows gains of 0.2% against the loonie and Swiss franc and 0.1% versus the euro and Aussie dollar, no change relative to the yuan, and declines of 0.3% relative to the kiwi and 0.1% against the yen and sterling. The 10-year Japanese JGB and German bund yields dipped a basis point […] More
Foreign Exchange Insights and Next Week
Next Week
August 23, 2013
Central banks hold policy meetings next week in Israel, Brazil and Hungary. Bank of England Governor Carney testifies before parliament, and Lacker, Bullard, and Williams are among the Fed officials speaking publicly. Many countries will be reporting producer price figures such as Spain, Sweden, Greece, Finland, Canada, Iceland, Singapore, Brazil, South Africa, Austria, Cyprus, and […] More
New Overnight Developments Abroad - Daily Update
Revised German and British 2Q GDP Data Released
August 23, 2013
In a pretty nondescript summer Friday, the main development has been an upward revision of U.K. GDP growth of a 0.1 percentage point. Such went up by 0.7% between the first and second quarters and was 1.5% greater than in the second quarter of 2012. Quarter-over-quarter gains amounted to 0.4% in personal consumption, 0.9% in […] More
Foreign Exchange Insights and Next Week
Fed Tapering and the Dollar
August 22, 2013
Federal Reserve officials believe that the size of its balance sheet, not the incremental rate of asset purchases, reflects its monetary policy stance and maintain that a planned gradual tapering down of monthly asset purchases is not a tightening of policy. Results over the past 3-1/2 months support a different conception favored by many private […] More
New Overnight Developments Abroad - Daily Update
Bad News and Good News
August 22, 2013
The bad news came first. Although FOMC minutes failed to embody an overwhelming message that QE tapering will begin in September with some members concerned about slippage in certain economic trends, an expression of broad support for the concept of tapering lifted long-term interest rates further and weighed on stocks in the Pacific Rim. The […] More
Central Bank Watch
Bank of Iceland Keeps 7-Day Lending Rate at 6.0%
August 21, 2013
A released statement from Iceland’s Monetary Policy Committee following today’s fifth policy meeting of 2013 made no changes to the final paragraph including the sentence on forward interest rate guidance. The degree to which such normalization takes place through changes in nominal Central Bank rates will depend on future inflation developments, which in turn will […] More
Central Bank Watch
No Rate Change from the Bank of Thailand
August 21, 2013
Monetary officials in Thailand had already sliced their policy rate four times, each by 25 basis points, from 3.5% prior to November 2011 to the current level of 2.5% since May 2013. 2.5% was retained after today’s meeting, although one of the seven policymakers preferred a 25-bp cut as a precautionary gesture to ensure continuous […] More
New Overnight Developments Abroad - Daily Update
Stronger Dollar, Weaker Bonds and Stocks Ahead of FOMC Minutes
August 21, 2013
Investors hope to get fresh insights into what the FOMC might announce next month on QE3 from minutes of the prior FOMC meeting, which get published at 18:00 GMT today. Meantime, the dollar has risen 0.6% against the kiwi, 0.5% versus the Australian dollar, 0.3% relative to the loonie and 0.2% against the yen, euro […] More
Central Bank Watch
Turkish Monetary Policy Tightened Further in Anti-Inflationary Move
August 20, 2013
The overnight central bank lending rate, which was boosted 75 basis points in July, has been raised by a further 50 bps to 7.75% in an action that caught analysts by surprise. In a statement of explanation, officials cited dangers posed by above-target inflation and financial market volatility (i.e. lira depreciation) and left the door […] More
