Marking Time Monday
February 26, 2024
Today has been another Monday, with scant news to act upon and investors looking ahead to events later in the week with market-moving potential.
The dollar has settled back 0.2% on a weighted basis, dipping 0.3% against the euro, 0.2% versus sterling and 0.1% relative to the Canadian currency but edging 0.1% higher against the yen. Following sizable gains last week, U.S. stock futures are 0.1% lower in pre-open action. The Japanese Nikkei closed 0.4% higher, but most other stock exchanges in the Pacific Rim fell such as in China (-0.9%), India (-0.5%), Hong Kong (also -0.5%) and South Korea (also -0.8%).
10-year sovereign debt yields are mixed, rising 2-3 basis points in Euroland’s four largest economies and by seven basis points in the U.K., but dropping three basis points in Japan and holding steady in the United States. The prices of bitcoin tokens, WTI oil and gold are down 1.3%, 0.4% and 0.4%.
European Central Bank President Lagarde speaks publicly later today, and Israeli interest rate policy is being reviewed today. New Zealand monetary policymakers will announced their latest interest rate decision on Wednesday. The U.S. data menu this week features monthly personal income and spending and the all-important PCE price deflator. U.S. house price and quarterly GDP will also be reported. Manufacturing purchasing manager survey findings arrive on Friday, and Japan has the usual end-of-month widely ranging list of indicator releases due.
Corporate service prices in Japan fell 0.5% in January, trimming the 12-month increase back to a 4-month low of 2.1%.
The Confederation of British Industry’s monthly distributive trades survey index improved substantially in February to a 10-month high of -7 from January’s deeply negative reading of -50.
Spanish producer prices posted their eleventh straight year-on-year decline, but the drop of 3.8% in January was the least steep in 10 months.
Industrial production in Singapore fell 5.7% last month on top of a 1.3% monthly slide in December, and the 1.1% 12-month rate of rise was considerably smaller than forecast.
Lithuanian industrial production rose 7.1% on month and by a 7-month high 4.9% in year-on-year terms.
Construction output in Ireland posted a third consecutive quarterly contraction in the final quarter of 2023 and posted on-year decreases of 6.3% compared to a year earlier and 4.8% in 2023 as a whole.
Copyright 2024, Larry Greenberg. All rights reserved. No secondary distribution without express permission.
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