Macro-News round-up:
#MarketNews
– China: The focus of attention this week has shifted to China’s reopening following its Lunar New Year holiday. Chinese financial markets, meanwhile, have not been overly enthused.
Today, the CSI 300 in China was only able to gain 0.6%. In addition, the Hang Seng index dropped. In a same vein, the offshore renminbi, or CNH, did not move much today and has not affected the 7.20 support level.
– Europe: Finland published its inflation rate, in line with expectations and declining. However, Sweden has published an inflation rate above expectations and rebounding from the previous period’s values. Inflation rises to 5.4% from the previous 4.4%.
The release of the February flash PMIs on Thursday and the ECB survey of negotiated wage rates tomorrow both hold great interest for the eurozone.
Poland will provide data on the labour market, industrial production, and PPI tomorrow. The decline in industrial production in December should be corrected.
– EE.UU: There is not a lot scheduled for the US this week, and US markets are closed today in observance of Presidents’ Day. Perhaps the most relevant data will be the release of the PMIs & initial job claims on Thursday and the Fed’s Waller comments on Thursday night to Friday in Europe.
The DXY dollar index had a good week last week, staying just shy of 105 points, since then retreating slightly to approximately 104.25 points. It seems to indicate a clear uptrend, which has been reinforced by last week’s pickup in inflation. We will see what influence this may have on the EURUSD pair with the data released by Europe this week.
– Geopolitics: The Russian opposition leader Navalny died on Friday in prison, generating since then a wave of statements throughout the West condemning his death. Several cities in Europe and the United States have launched protests in front of Russian embassies.
It should be recalled that Julian Assange has been imprisoned since 2010 for denouncing war crimes committed by the U.S. in Iraq. On the other hand, the Chilean-American writer Gonzalo Lira, was arrested by the Ukrainian intelligence services accusing him of being a disinformer. He died last month in the custody of the Ukrainian authorities, but does not seem to have generated the same interest the case.
Amid tensions and internal debates about NATO in Europe, and just a week after Trump questioned NATO’s own deployment. China offers security cooperation to a European state, Hungary.
Public Security Minister Wang Xiaohong informed Orbán last week that China expects to strengthen law enforcement and security relationships with Hungary as the two countries celebrate 75 years of diplomatic relations, according to the official Xinhua news agency.
