Central Bank of Armenia
Calm Before U.S. CPI Release
March 12, 2024
U.S. February consumer price data will be released within the half hour and are expected to reflect an unchanged year-on-year rate but lower underlying price pressure. In the meantime, the dollar has risen overnight by 0.3% against the yen and 0.2% versus sterling but is otherwise just marking time. Ten-year sovereign debt yields have dropped […] More
Kyrgyzstan and Armenia
October 31, 2023
The Central Bank of Armenia‘s interest rate has been reduced by a further 25 basis points to 9.5%. This was the fourth cut since June, totaling 125 basis points from a peak of 10.75% reached initially last December. Officials are proceeding cautiously in light of the much steeper descent of CPI inflation from 10.3% in […] More
U.S. Equities Not Out of the Woods and Yen Drops After BOJ Policy Tweet
October 31, 2023
Yesterday’s 1.2-1.6% advance in major U.S. stock market indices appears more a case of bottom-fishing than the start of an uptrend. The FOMC’s two-day policy review that starts today isn’t expected to result in an interest rate hike, but the post-meeting press conference will likely strike a hawkish tone in light of recent robust U.S. […] More
Weighted Dollar Strengthens to Three-Week High, While Bitcoin Weakens to Six-Week Low
August 1, 2023
The dollar strengthened overnight by 1.3% against the Australian dollar, 0.9% versus the New Zealand dollar, 0.6% vis-a-vis the Canadian dollar, 0.5% relative to the Japanese yen, 0.4% against the Swiss franc and sterling, 0.3% versus the Chinese renminbi and Mexican peso, but just 0.2% against the euro. The price of Bitcoin tokens dropped 1.2%. […] More
Armenian Central Bank Rate Cut
June 13, 2023
Armenia got its first central bank interest rate cut since 2020. Early in the pandemic, the Central Bank of Armenia’s refinancing rate had been at 5.25% from May 2020 until an initial hike in February 2021. In the face of accelerating CPI inflation that crested at around an 11-year high of 10.3% last June, the […] More
Softer Dollar Ahead of U.S. CPI Release
June 13, 2023
The dollar in overnight trading lost 0.5% against sterling, 0.4% versus the euro and Aussie dollar, and 0.3% relative to the Swiss franc. Alternatively, the dollar touched a fresh record high of 24.106 Turkish lira but subsequently unwound the incremental gain and a tad more. Much is riding on today’s U.S. CPI figures, which analysts […] More
Great Relief When U.S. CPI Fails to Exceed Expectations
March 14, 2023
The U.S. consumer price report for February was actually not entirely encouraging. But after a strong of worse-than-expected price news, the 6.0% year-on-year rise of total consumer prices matched expectations and represented the eighth decline in a rose from 6.4% in January and 9.1% last June. That was enough to send U.S. stock futures up […] More
Financial Markets Exhibit Astounding Sensitivity to a Single Inflation Data Point
December 13, 2022
When the wires flashed news that U.S. CPI inflation in November was lower than forecast, share prices soared while the U.S. 10-year Treasury yield and the dollar plunged. The instant reaction of the stock market was significantly reduced in pretty short time, but the sensitivity of financial markets underscored how uncertain traders feel about current […] More
Investors Heartened by Unconfirmed Social Media Reports that Chinese Covid Restrictions Will Be Relaxed Soon
November 1, 2022
Stock markets in the Pacific Rim soared 5.2% in Hong Kong, 2.6% in China, 1.7% in Australia, 1.8% in South Korea, and 1.2% in Singapore. Japan’s Nikkei firmed only 0.3%, by contrast, but equities in German, France, Great Britain, Spain and Italy are all trading 1-2% higher so far today. U.S. future point to a […] More
Armenian Interest Rate Hike to 9.5%
August 2, 2022
The Central Bank of Armenia had cut its refinancing rate in 2020 to a 10-year low of 4.5%. Increases from May 2021 had totaled 325 basis points by the end of that year and have been followed three more moves so far in 2022: 25 basis points in February, 125 bps in March and 50 […] More
