- FX option expiries for Tuesday 21 December 2021 at the 10am New York cut
- Nomura says the PBOC will sell yuan to help support China's slowing economy
- Japan PM Kishida says again he is not considering changing the sales tax rate
- Regulatory crackdowns in China re expected to extend further into 2022
- New Zealand credit card spending for November +4.5% m/m (prior 9.3%)
- Christmas has come early to markets
- PBOC sets USD/ CNY reference rate for today at 6.3729 (vs. estimate at 6.3711)
- Another Australian state loosens border control
- New Zealand will reduce booster gap wait to 4 months (from 6)
- Australian state loosens border controls
- RBA minutes: Board is prepared to be patient, committed to highly supportive conditions
- UK data - Lloyds Bank monthly business confidence survey holds steady at 40 this month.
- South Korea exports continue their rocketing surge. First 20 days of December +20% y/y
- Japan is considering hiking its GDP forecast for 2022 to 3% from 2.2%
- Goldman Sachs maintain their S&P 500 target by the end of 2022 of 5,100.
- 0.01% of bitcoin holders control 27% of the currency in circulation
- NZD traders - heads up for the GDT dairy auction on Tuesday 21 December 2021
- ICYMI - Morgan Stanley is tipping Omicron will peak in 10-12 weeks (but could be sooner)
- Omicron tops the charts! Now the most popular COVID-19 variant.
- Australia weekly consumer confidence 108.4 (previous week was 108.0)
- ICYMI - ECB's De Guindos: Inflation in Europe "not as temporary as we expected"
- Biden and Manchin spoke again - to continue negotiations in the new year
- Trade ideas thread - Tuesday 21 December 2021
- Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison has called a snap meeting of national cabinet
- Major indices close lower on omicron fears
News and data flow tailed off further during the day here in Asia as we approach the holiday period. Of note was data from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) showing the dominance of the Omicron variant in the US (as of December 18 but released on the 20th, US time); now accounting for upwards of 73% of cases. This is a stunningly rapid rise, it was in the single digits only days ago.
Locally in the region we had December meeting minutes from the Reserve Bank of Australia. The minutes did not add a lot of new information as Governor Lowe had spoken since the Dec. Meeting. The minutes outlined the 3 options on RBA bond-buying (QE) that Lowe covered in his speech, links here:
- RBA Governor Lowe repeats that in no hurry to raise interest rates
- RBA Gov. Lowe says not his job to target high house prices, higher rates not the solution
but in a nutshell these are:
- reduce bond buying in February and end in May
- end in February
- reduce in February, review again in May
That first option is consistent with the RBA’s central forecasts. Interestingly the latest calls from Australia’s ‘big four’ banks have three tipping option 2 above (an end to bond purchases in Feb.) while one (Westpac) are nominating the first option (end in May).
Scanning across major forex rates you'll see little net change for the session.
US equity index futures gained on Globex.
New Zealand postponed its international reopening and shortened the re commended period between the second dose of COVID-19 vaccine and the booster short (to 4 months from 6). NZD/USD has added a few ticks:
