However, for US Dollar bulls, tomorrow’s speech by Fed Chair Janet Yellen at the Jackson Hole Economic Policy Symposium may prove to be a disappointment. Minutes from the US central bank’s July 26-27 policy meeting showed broad agreement that more economic data is needed before raising interest rates, but recent comments from other policymakers have been much more hawkish.
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National Australia Bank’s Ray Attrill believes that the bigger talking point should be how effective already stretched monetary policy could be in overcoming a possible slump.
Offshore yuan in Hong Kong was down 0.03 per cent in early trade to 6.6730, before bouncing back to 6.6683 by 11am.
Jasper Lo, chief executive of King International, said the market had turned quiet on Thursday as traders awaited a speech by Yellen to the Jackson Hole Symposium, at 11am United States time (about 10pm HK time) on Friday. The broader Standard & Poor’s 500 stock index was 0.2% lower and the Nasdaq composite was down 0.2%. Still, prediction markets only ascribing a one-in-five chance of a September move and don’t anticipate an increase to the Federal Funds rate till 2017.
Iron ore dropped 2.8 percent in Singapore after Li Xinchuang, a vice chairman at the China Iron & Steel Association, said falling steel production in China should weigh on prices for the raw material.
Traders expect an 18 percent chance of a rate hike in September and a chance of about 55 percent in December, according to CME Group’s FedWatch program.
Moreover, the July durable goods report revealed an overall +4.4 percent m/m reading, above market expectations for a +3.7 percent m/m result, as compared to the revised -4.2 percent m/m reading that occurred in June (previous -4.0 percent m/m).
Initial jobless claims fell for a third straight week to to 261,000.
Movers and shakers: Shares of Workday Inc.(WDAY) jumped 9.2% ahead of the bell, after the finance and human resources cloud company late Wednesday posted revenue ahead of forecasts (http://www.marketwatch.com/story/workday-shares-rise-as-second-quarter-revenue-tops-street-view-2016-08-24).
At 9:38 a.m. ET the Dow Jones Industrial Average .DJI was down 22.66 points, or 0.12 percent, at 18,458.82.
Tiffany TIF.N rose 1.6 percent to $70 after the company reported a better-than-expected quarterly profit.
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The performance of the United States dollar in the week ahead will be dictated by the market’s interpretation of Fed Chair Yellen’s speech at Jackson Hole.
