A traders' week ahead playbook - A fresh set of challenges await
Marquee event risks to navigate:
Debt ceiling headlines – President Biden meets with Congressional leaders on Tuesday to try and inject some urgency in forging an agreement to raise the debt limit before 1 June. We’re already seeing clear stress in US T-bills maturing in mid-June, so the market is certainly taking the threat of moving past the June X-date seriously. Given the tight window to negotiate, there is a tight window which increases the possibility of a short-term extension.
It seems a matter of time before traders start to look at the JPY and gold as the default debt ceiling hedges.
US CPI (Wed 22:30 AEST) – the marquee data point of the week. The consensus estimate is for headline CPI at 0.4% MoM, and 0.3% MoM on core CPI, with the core YoY pace eyed at 5.5% (from 5.6% in March). With the market not pricing any hikes for June it would need a big upside surprise to see the market price in hikes for the next Fed meeting – interestingly, in the past 6 CPI prints the USD has fallen in five of those (in the 5 minutes after the data drops), while gold has rallied in all 6 occurrences.
A print below 5.3% would see cuts being priced for June and price July as a 50:50 proposition; a clear positive for gold and see the NAS100 push towards my 13,800 target.
Fed’s Senior loan officers survey (Monday at 04:00 AEST) – with the market looking for a tightening in lending standards, resulting in a credit crunch and potentially future recessionary conditions, this survey matters. Fed chair Jay Powell knew the outcome and mentioned the survey in his press conference last week, detailing the survey will show tighter lending practices. The survey has historically been well correlated where tighter lending standards results in wider corporate credit spreads and drawdown in the S&P500.
BoE meeting (Thursday 23:00 AEST) – Given the recent inflation print, the BoE should almost certainly hike by 25bp, with the market fully pricing this outcome. The split in the MPC voting may matter, with the markets discounting that the BoE hike again in June and possibly August. GBP has been strongest vs the JPY and EUR, with EURGBP eyeing a break of the YTD range lows. GBPUSD trades at the highest levels since May 2022 and while it’s tough making a call on GBPUSD with US CPI due this week, I’m not fading this strength just yet.
US PPI (Thursday 22:30 AEST) – The market will pick and choose when it wants to react to the PPI data point, so it’s a risk event to consider. The consensus is we see PPI +2.5% YoY (from 2.7%), with core PPI eyed at 3.3% YoY (from 3.4%). While the PPI data is important (especially when considering corporate margins), unless we see a big surprise, I’d expect market moves to be fairly contained over this print.
China (April) credit data – there is no set time for the credit data (new yuan loans, M2 money supply and aggregate financing, but given credit has been largely front-loaded in 2023, to support the re-opening, it should be expected that new yuan loans and aggregate financing fall significantly from the lofty levels we saw in March. An outcome above RMB1400b (in new yuan loans) could boost China’s markets and China proxies (AUD and copper, for example). The CHINAH index is tracking a range, but I see scope for a push into 7000.
China CPI/PPI (Thursday 11:30 AEST) – the market sees CPI at a lowly 0.3% YoY (from 0.7%) and PPI at -3.2%. In a world of high inflation, China is the clear outlier and a below-consensus reading could see renewed calls for policy easing – China’s bond markets are finding solid buyers of late (yields lower) and this may start to impact, with a weaker yuan the possible result - watch USDCNH as a guide and any upside in this cross (yuan weakness) could weigh on the AUD and NZD.
US April NFIB small business optimism (Tuesday 21:00 AEST) – this is a survey I am watching very closely given the leverage US SMEs have to the smaller and regional US banks. The market sees the survey coming in at 89.8 (from 90.1 in March), which if correct, would be the weakest read since 2013 and a sharp decline from levels seen in 2021.
Australia govt FY 2024 budget (Tuesday 19:30 AEST) – the budget is being viewed on three main ideals: the cost-of-living relief, economic growth, and Australia being more resilient to international shocks. One that should get media airtime, and could impact the AUS200, but it’s unlikely to be a driver of AUD volatility. AUDUSD shorts have been covering and we see price testing trend resistance, but the big level remains the Feb- May range high at 0.6800.
Fed speakers – Kashkari, Jefferson, Williams, Waller, Daly, Bullard
ECB speakers – Lane, Rehn, Vasle, Schnabel, Centeno, De Cos, Guindos
Debt ceiling headlines – President Biden meets with Congressional leaders on Tuesday to try and inject some urgency in forging an agreement to raise the debt limit before 1 June. We’re already seeing clear stress in US T-bills maturing in mid-June, so the market is certainly taking the threat of moving past the June X-date seriously. Given the tight window to negotiate, there is a tight window which increases the possibility of a short-term extension.
It seems a matter of time before traders start to look at the JPY and gold as the default debt ceiling hedges.
US CPI (Wed 22:30 AEST) – the marquee data point of the week. The consensus estimate is for headline CPI at 0.4% MoM, and 0.3% MoM on core CPI, with the core YoY pace eyed at 5.5% (from 5.6% in March). With the market not pricing any hikes for June it would need a big upside surprise to see the market price in hikes for the next Fed meeting – interestingly, in the past 6 CPI prints the USD has fallen in five of those (in the 5 minutes after the data drops), while gold has rallied in all 6 occurrences.
A print below 5.3% would see cuts being priced for June and price July as a 50:50 proposition; a clear positive for gold and see the NAS100 push towards my 13,800 target.
Fed’s Senior loan officers survey (Monday at 04:00 AEST) – with the market looking for a tightening in lending standards, resulting in a credit crunch and potentially future recessionary conditions, this survey matters. Fed chair Jay Powell knew the outcome and mentioned the survey in his press conference last week, detailing the survey will show tighter lending practices. The survey has historically been well correlated where tighter lending standards results in wider corporate credit spreads and drawdown in the S&P500.
BoE meeting (Thursday 23:00 AEST) – Given the recent inflation print, the BoE should almost certainly hike by 25bp, with the market fully pricing this outcome. The split in the MPC voting may matter, with the markets discounting that the BoE hike again in June and possibly August. GBP has been strongest vs the JPY and EUR, with EURGBP eyeing a break of the YTD range lows. GBPUSD trades at the highest levels since May 2022 and while it’s tough making a call on GBPUSD with US CPI due this week, I’m not fading this strength just yet.
US PPI (Thursday 22:30 AEST) – The market will pick and choose when it wants to react to the PPI data point, so it’s a risk event to consider. The consensus is we see PPI +2.5% YoY (from 2.7%), with core PPI eyed at 3.3% YoY (from 3.4%). While the PPI data is important (especially when considering corporate margins), unless we see a big surprise, I’d expect market moves to be fairly contained over this print.
China (April) credit data – there is no set time for the credit data (new yuan loans, M2 money supply and aggregate financing, but given credit has been largely front-loaded in 2023, to support the re-opening, it should be expected that new yuan loans and aggregate financing fall significantly from the lofty levels we saw in March. An outcome above RMB1400b (in new yuan loans) could boost China’s markets and China proxies (AUD and copper, for example). The CHINAH index is tracking a range, but I see scope for a push into 7000.
China CPI/PPI (Thursday 11:30 AEST) – the market sees CPI at a lowly 0.3% YoY (from 0.7%) and PPI at -3.2%. In a world of high inflation, China is the clear outlier and a below-consensus reading could see renewed calls for policy easing – China’s bond markets are finding solid buyers of late (yields lower) and this may start to impact, with a weaker yuan the possible result - watch USDCNH as a guide and any upside in this cross (yuan weakness) could weigh on the AUD and NZD.
US April NFIB small business optimism (Tuesday 21:00 AEST) – this is a survey I am watching very closely given the leverage US SMEs have to the smaller and regional US banks. The market sees the survey coming in at 89.8 (from 90.1 in March), which if correct, would be the weakest read since 2013 and a sharp decline from levels seen in 2021.
Australia govt FY 2024 budget (Tuesday 19:30 AEST) – the budget is being viewed on three main ideals: the cost-of-living relief, economic growth, and Australia being more resilient to international shocks. One that should get media airtime, and could impact the AUS200, but it’s unlikely to be a driver of AUD volatility. AUDUSD shorts have been covering and we see price testing trend resistance, but the big level remains the Feb- May range high at 0.6800.
Fed speakers – Kashkari, Jefferson, Williams, Waller, Daly, Bullard
ECB speakers – Lane, Rehn, Vasle, Schnabel, Centeno, De Cos, Guindos
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