Commodities were left confused for another week, and face more of the same in the days ahead.

The quality of China’s August jobs data holds the key to the week for investors in Australia and around the world.

The Aussie dollar will dominate local markets this week after a big slide saw it close at yet another six and a bit year low of 69.08 US cents early Saturday morning.

A September Fed rate hike remains on the table later this month after August’s jobs report didn’t settle things.

Oh dear, another round of handwringing and fretting over a surprise economic figure, this time the 0.1% dip in retail sales in August, especially in some of the Fairfax media websites and papers.

It will be a hesitant day of trading on markets in Asia and for the start in Europe while they await the August jobs data for the US. That will be released at 10.30 pm Sydney time and most US analysts see more than 200,000 jobs being created and the jobless rate remaining steady at 5.3%.

Trading on global markets should be less frenetic today and tomorrow with the Chinese markets closed for the massive celebrations of the end of World War 2.

Australian June quarter economic growth was soft at just 2% year on year (and 0.2% for the June quarter, down from 0.9% in the three months to March), as the economy continues its slow, wobbly transition from the resources boom.

The Future Fund went heavily into cash in the closing months of 2014-15 as global volatility rose on the back of the start of the sell-off in China in mid-June.

More doubts about the health of the Chinese economy yesterday as the two major measures of the country’s huge manufacturing sector showed slides to levels not seen for three to six years.

Oil prices plunged, stockmarkets sold off heavily and there seems to be more to come today after the weak Chinese manufacturing activity reports renewed fears about the health of the world’s most important economy.

The continuing slide in the Chinese economy and stockmarkets overtook yesterday’s non-decision on interest rates from the Reserve Bank.

Losses and acres of red ink around financial markets across the globe, except in oil (which surged again for a third trading session overnight) and gold.

There was nothing in yesterday’s dump of economic data to force the Reserve Bank off its ‘wait and watch’ stance on interest rate movements ahead of the central bank’s board meeting later today.

Warren Buffett and Berkshire Hathaway have made some eclectic investment decisions this year – getting out of oil and energy, and oil refining, buying into food, manufacturing (and getting his Burlington railroad unit to investment billions more in upgrading its network and on new equipment).

US jobs, the health of manufacturing around the world (especially in China), central bank meetings and Australian economic growth will be the dominant stories for markets to contend with in the coming week, along with the fate of the long mooted rise in US interest rates and Friday night’s US jobs report for August.

The Australian June 30 profit reporting season wraps up today and tomorrow with the stragglers, tiddlers and loss-makers lodging their reports. Tonight is the cut off and those that stagger in tomorrow morning will represent the backlog from today.

So a cautious start to markets today with all eyes again on how Shanghai starts trading later this morning.

So how long can traders keep oil prices at their elevated levels of last Friday after last week’s 12% surge?

Our market is heading for another strong opening this morning after a wild, volatile day on Wall Street that was only saved from being a near wipeout by a surge in the last 10 to 15 minutes of trading.

All eyes will again be on Shanghai later this morning to see if Chinese investors are convinced the big rebound on Wall Street (finally) can be sustained across the rest of today, or whether local concerns will again triumph.