The Fed Reserve in the US and the Chinese economy will be major areas of interest for markets and investors this week.
There’s the minutes of the last Fed meeting which will be released on Thursday and chair Jay Powell makes two appearances before Congress in his regular mid-year testimony, which will see quite a few questions on interest rates, especially after the stronger than expected jobs performance in June.
The Fed’s easing bias will be on display in Powell’s appearances before the Senate and House of Representatives Committees, but the impact of the better than forecast jobs data on the central bank’s thinking will be explored.
The Fed minutes will show the central bank’s thinking at the last meeting when the easing bias was made obvious, but that’s a bit dated after the 244,000 new jobs in May and no change in May’s 3.1% wage growth.
US consumer inflation data for June will be out on Thursday and the core reading is forecast to remain around 2% year on year.
The June quarter earnings season starts quietly with Levi Strauss, Delta Airlines, Pepsi Co and Cargill all due to report this week. The pace steps up next week with reports from the major US banks.
The June monthly, quarter and half year data releases this week will give us a good idea of how the Chinese economy is traveling.
There’s consumer inflation midweek along with car sales, and then trade and credit figures on Friday.
The AMP’s Chief Economist, Dr. Shane Oliver says we can expect “headline CPI inflation (Wednesday) remaining around 2.7% year on year but core inflation remaining weak.” He also says the June trade data on Friday is expected to see falls in both exports and imports.
In Australia, a quiet week with the June NAB business survey tomorrow expected to show a fall in business confidence and continuing weak business conditions. The monthly Westpac consumer confidence on Wednesday is forecast to remain subdued and housing finance data for May on Thursday could reveal a small improvement.
There’s one early June 30 reporter this week – Mirrabooka Investments of Melbourne while June quarter production and sales report will start emerging from the mining sector.
