Forex news for Asia trading Friday 13 January 2017
China:
- PBOC reported to ask banks to balance yuan inflows with outflows
- More China data: Aggregate financing RMB (Dec): 1630.0bn (expected 1300bn)
- China trade balance for December: + 40.82USD bn (expected +$47.55bn)
- China customs - China is the biggest loser in anti-globalisation trend
- China trade balance for 2016: + 3.35 tln CNY
- PBOC sets USD/CNY mid-point today at 6.8909 (vs. yesterday at 6.9141)
- BOJ's quarterly survey of household sentiment ... surprising inflation expectations
- Japan earthquake - M5.0, 93 km E of Tokyo (a little while ago)
- Is the US economy slowing faster than USD bulls expect? Check this out ...
- Goldman Sachs on sterling: Stay short for more downside on Article 50 activation
- USD/JPY pops 115
- Japan eco minister Ishihara: Will continue to monitor yen for rapid rises
- More from Fed's Yellen Q&A: We may be operating in a world of low interest rates
- Fed's Yellen Q&A now: Fed focus is on low unemployment, low & stable inflation
- Federal Reserve Chair Yellen: No specific eco nor policy outlook comments
- Hamburger-based currency valuation model has USD overvalued against nearly everything
- Warren Buffett's 3 principles
- UAE oil minister said crude at $50 a barrel is too low for most producing countries
- Wee bit of USD strength early here
- Trade ideas thread for Friday the 13th (spooky!)
- New Zealand - Card spending (December), Retail -0.1% m/m (expected +1%)
- Euro zone finance ministers to discuss rescue for Italy's Monte Paschi on January 26
China's December (and 2016 as a whole) trade data was the highlight of the news for the session today, but we got some swings in FX rates through the day also.
December trade data for China:
- Soft global demand was cited as weighing on China's exports
- Exports fell 6.1% from a year earlier in December (USD terms)
- Imports were up by 3.1% y/y (USD terms)
- The trade surplus was $40.8 billion
- A falling yuan cushioned the export fall in local currency terms (exports registered up 0.6% y/y in CNY terms)
- China also made a point of letting us know that the country faces challenges from a potentially more protectionist Trump administration in the US
We also got full-year trade balance data from China today:
- Exports -2% (yuan terms)
- Imports +0.6% (yuan terms)
- And a trade surplus of 3.35 trillion yuan ($485 billion). Yowza.
In other China trade data snippets:
- China's coal imports in December up over 50% on a year ago, stockpiling cited as a driver
- For the full year coal imports +25.2% from a year earlie, reducing capacity locally cited
- Chinese imports of iron ore -8% y/y in December (admittedly from record highs a year earlier)
- For the full year, up 7.5%, economic stimulus measures said to be the driver
Currencies for the session ...
Yen crosses were movers, pretty much steadily higher through most of the session, but above 115 the pace of the USD/JPY slowed and stabilised (circa 115.17 highs). Yen crosses tracked higher alongside; EUR/JPY:
Of interest out of Japan today, economy minister Ishihara made a point of mentioning the administration is keeping an eye on any rapid yen appreciation moves. If you're after a 'reason' for the yen weakness, I suppose that's as good as any (how often to these fellows say such things and nothing happens? That's a rhetorical question, the answer is quite a lot. But, hey, we'll take what we got today).
Elsewhere, EUR, CHF and GBP against the USD all stayed in small ranges and are little changed overall on the day.
AUD/USD popped above 0.7500 but then lost all its gained ground to be more or less unchanged on the session as I update. NZD/USD is marginally higher though
Gold has lost a dollar or so, it has been a little lower but is middish range as I update. Really, there isn't much in it either way on the session. Oil ... near enough to unchanged also.
More:
This isn't FX, its politics. But we all better become accustomed to politics as a market influence in coming months and years. One tweet away and all that ...
This is from the Israeli press, link here:
- Israeli intelligence officials are concerned that the exposure of classified information to their American counterparts under a Trump administration could lead to their being leaked to Russia and onward to Iran
- The intelligence concerns, which have been discussed in closed forums recently, are based on suspicions of unreported ties between President-elect Donald Trump, or his associates, and the government of Vladimir Putin in Moscow
- American intelligence officials expressed despair at the election of Trump during a recent meeting with their Israeli counterparts
- They said that they believed that Putin had "leverages of pressure" over Trump, though they did not elaborate. The American media reported on Wednesday that Russia has embarrassing intelligence about the president-elect.
Have a great weekend all! Rock on!
