Three snapshots for Wednesday
Markets starting to worry about an end to QE/LTRO liquidity?
Forward looking PMI data is starting to show a divergence between the UK and the euro zone:
German factory orders, which tend to lead GDP growth, fell 6.1% in February from the previous year.
Three snapshots for Monday
ISM report on U.S. manufacturing shows PMI at 53.4 in March against 52.4 in February:
Euro zone unemployment rose to 10.8% in February, with youth unemployment in Spain reaching 50.5%
China’s official Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI) hit an 11-month high with a stronger-than-expected reading but a separate private survey by HSBC, which focuses more on smaller factories than the large state-owned enterprises captured in the official data, painted a gloomier picture:
Three snapshots for Friday
The correlation between individual country equity indices is rising again:
U.S. consumer spending jumps in February but income growth tepid.
Apple vs. RIM market value:
Three snapshots for Monday
Is China heading for a hard or soft landing? One chart to keep an eye on is the relative performance of materials equities, the long run of outperformance since 2000 looks like it might be rolling over.
Germany’s Ifo business sentiment index rose unexpectedly in March, moving in the opposite direction to the the PMI released last week:
Italian consumer morale also rose to 96.8, economists were expecting a slight decline to 93.7.
Three snapshots for Friday
Yesterday’s much worse than expected PMI data from the euro zone has pushed the Citigroup economic surprise index for the region below zero.
Germany has been one of the strongest performing equity markets this year but is still in the middle of the pack compared to other European countries on valuation.
U.S. new home sales slipped 1.6 percent to a seasonally adjusted 313,000-unit annual rate. Economists polled by Reuters had forecast sales at a 325,000-unit rate in February.
Three snapshots for Thursday
The euro zone’s economy took an unexpected turn for the worse in March, hit by a sharp fall in French and German factory activity. The manufacturing purchasing managers indexes for France and Germany were both worse than even the most pessimistic expectations from economists polled by Reuters.
China’s HSBC manufacturing PMI also fell to 48.1, below 50 for a fifth straight month.
“Reflation trade”? Equities have been tracking the 5yr breakeven inflation rate derived from inflation-protected bonds.
Three snapshots for Wednesday
Saudi Arabia has repeated publicly it would prime its pumps to meet any shortfall in exports from fellow OPEC member Iran, this chart shows their production since 1980:
Unwelcome news for British finance minister George Osborne ahead of today’s budget – February public sector borrowing comes in at £15.2bn against expectations for £8bn.
Along with the rise in bond yields, expectations for interest rates at end 2013 and 2014 have started to pick up:
Three snapshots for Tuesday
U.S. February housing starts fall slightly to a 698,000 annual rate:
UK inflation edged down to 3.4% in February:
Spanish banks’ bad loans highest since August 1994
Three snapshots for Monday
The NAHB U.S. homebuilder sentiment index held at 28, below economists’ expectations for 30.
Apple will initiate a regular quarterly dividend of $2.65 a share in July and will buy back up to $10 billion of its stock starting in fiscal 2013.
Energy leads the way for commodities this year, but with a big divergence between the components – gasoline sitting at the top while natural gas sits near the bottom.
Three snapshots for Monday
China’s trade balance plunged $31.5 billion into the red in February as imports swamped exports. It followed reports on Friday that inflation cooled in February while retail sales and industrial output fell below forecast, all pointing to a gradual cooling.
Investors ploughed more money into hedge funds over the past month as performance has picked up after last year’s losses.
Final Q4 Italian GDP growth came in at -0.7%q/q. This chart showing GDP vs the Markit purchasing managers’ index shows the current recession may continue into this year.
