Stock Excange News: 2014

Last week the dollar strengthened versus most of the major developed-nation currencies.
Today, the yen slid against the euro and the dollar ahead of Japan’s Deputy Governor Kikuo Iwata speech. During his speech he warned that if inflation remains below 1% for a long period of time, it will increase the risk of deflation.
The preliminary China’s purchasing manufacturing Managers’ Index for March from HSBC and Markit Economics dropped to 48.1 from 48.5 in February and, missing market estimates of 48.7.Numbers below 50 signal contraction.
During the Asian morning, Australia’s currency weakened against most of its 16 major peers after China’s factory data. However it erased the losses and gained even more within the following hours.
Gold prices eased further in Asia on Monday after the China HSBC Flash Purchasing Managers Index data. Brent oil and West Texas Intermediate fell after a gauge of factory production in China contracted for a third month.
More March PMIs are due out during the European day. We have the preliminary figures for both the manufacturing and service sectors from France, Germany and Eurozone as a whole. France’s manufacturing PMI is forecast to be slightly down, while the service-sector PMI is expected to rise. Both Germany’s PMIs are estimated to be lower. Eurozone’s preliminary manufacturing PMI for March is expected to decline while the preliminary service sector figure is expected to remain unchanged.
In the US, the preliminary Markit manufacturing PMI for March is estimated to decline to 56.5 from 57.1 in the previous month, while the Chicago Fed national activity index is forecast to have risen to 0.10 in February form -0.39 in January.
We have three speakers scheduled on Monday. Federal Reserve Governor Jeremy Stein gives welcoming remarks at a Fed conference, while the ECB governing council member Erkki Liikanen speaks at a press briefing. Bank of Canada Deputy Governor Tim Lane will also speak.

In Hungarian

2014. március 18., kedd

March 18, 2014 at 07:58PM: Twitter, Inc. stock dropped by 3.21%!

Twitter, Inc.( TWTR) is currently priced at 50.38

This 3.21 % decrease

Today is the first day of the March FOMC meeting, including the first press conference by the new FOMC Chair, Janet Yellen. I would guess that nobody expects any change in the “tapering” process, that is, the Committee is likely to reduce its monthly bond purchases by another USD 10bn. There is likely to be a change in the presentation of the FOMC’s forward guidance, much like occurred in the UK. I expect them to drop the line in the statement that says they will keep rates at their current level “as long as the unemployment rate remains above 6 1/2 %” and instead replace it with some fuzzier criteria on unemployment and inflation. However, the Committee will want to do this without giving the market any reason to think that rates will be hiked sooner than previously thought, so they will probably emphasize that they continue to expect it will be quite some time before they start to hike rates and that when they do start, they will do so slowly and cautiously â€“ much like what the Bank of England said. Nonetheless the experience of the BoE shows that this change could support the dollar.