Ahead of the Reserve Bank’s interest rate decision later today, a new all time record low was established yesterday for the key benchmark 10 year bond – 2.16%.

Normally the start of the monthly economic data from China would dominate financial markets, while the monthly meeting of the Reserve Bank would be the big news in Australia. But after last Friday night’s shock US jobs report for May, it’s a speech tonight by Fed chair Janet Yellen that will hold the attention of investors the world over.

The shockingly weak May jobs report takes a June rate rise from the Fed off the table, slashed the chances of a July increase and in fact has raised a big question mark over any rate increase this year.

Oil prices may have dipped last week, but they are still up more than 80% from their lows earlier in the year and it’s that gain which seems to have produced the first rise in oil rig use in the US in 10-months.

Shares were mostly soft last week with Friday’s shock jobs report for May, the big unexpected event of the week which has forced investors to rethink the timing of the next US interest rate rise from the Fed.

Exports continued to perform in April, building on the strong performance in the three months to March which helped drive GDP up by 1.1% from December. At the same time retail sales grew – not by as much as expected – but by enough to keep the tills ticking over.

No deal on oil at OPEC, but markets took the news in their stride – oil prices fell, then rebounded, gold eased, shares started sluggishly on Wall Street before ending higher, and overnight trading on the ASX 200 futures saw a 40 point gain pencilled in for the local market this morning.

For all the talk of income deficits and recessions, empty growth, export-driven growth and booms, and a growth ”mirage” to quote some of the media descriptions of the March quarter National Accounts from the Bureau of Statistics this week, the report was full of surprisingly good news.

A wary start to June for global markets as investors ignored the mostly positive performance in May.

Australian economic growth hit a 4-year high in the three months to March 31.

The March quarter GDP figures, due out in the latest national accounts later this morning, are shaping up to be better than expected – with some estimates as high as 1% for quarter on quarter growth.

Commodities took a whack in May from the rapid change of heart markets had about the next US interest rate rise – led by iron ore’s 24% slide, copper’s near 9% drop and gold’s near 6% slide. But oil had a 4th monthly rise because of production problems in some major producers.

Despite a fall in corporate profits in the March quarter, many economists are looking for March quarter GDP to surprise on the upside in tomorrow’s national accounts.

Most sharemarkets enjoyed a solid trading last week, thanks to rising confidence about stronger US growth, signs that the global oil market is rebalancing and the new debt deal for Greece which went more smoothly than expected.

Despite a rise in the value of the US dollar and expectations of a rate rise in the US in the next two months, most commodity markets enjoyed gains last week.

A week of data dumps around the world as major figures are released in Australia on economic growth, US jobs, the European Central Bank meets on Thursday night, there’s also an OPEC meeting Thursday night, our time, and the usual start of month surveys of manufacturing and services.

US Federal Reserve chair, Janet Yellen has firmly put an interest rate rise on the global agenda, sending the US dollar rising, the Aussie dollar lower, and bond yields rising as prices fell.

Media reports of the latest report from Fitch Ratings on the health of our big four banks did everything to find the downside – from over dependence on offshore funding (not quite), worries about the impact of a slowdown in China (not new) to fears about the impact of a downturn in housing prices (again not new).

There was Greens leader, Senator Richard Di Natale and others supporting dairy farmers hit by the price cuts and retrospective pricing moves of Murray Goulburn (MGC) and Fonterra (FSF), and missing an important development in the global dairy industry.

There was a telling lack of political interest in this week’s two key data releases for the March quarter – the value of construction work done and the private investment figures. No press releases, no comments, not a whimper of commentary for what on the face of it, were two rotten sets of figures. And on the whole they were, but as always there was some good news buried in the detail, and lazy as our campaigning politicians are (and many in the media), that good news slipped everyone’s attention.

Who’s afraid of the Federal Reserve? Not Wall Street, it seems, nor investors in other markets such as Australia as the rally in shares continues, despite the growing belief the US central bank will lift its key interest rate at meetings next month, or in July.