RBA prints its meeting minutes
Profit-taking grips the Asian markets
The Greenback took small steps back against its major counterparts, as a bit of profit-taking dominated forex trading during the Asian session.
Major Events:
RBA’s meeting minutes – The Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) has just printed its meeting minutes after keeping its interest rates steady at 1.50% earlier this month. The central banks’ release has three key takeaways:
First, RBA Governor Lowe and his gang are doing cartwheels over the recent rise in commodity prices. They said that it’s lighting a fire under Australia’s trade numbers, at least enough for the RBA to revise their growth forecasts higher. Of course, it also didn’t hurt that economic conditions in China, Australia’s largest trading partner, have somewhat steadied.
Next, the RBA is worried that the improvements in the unemployment rate aren’t translating to overall growth in the jobs sector. It said that ‘’members observed that there was uncertainty about the degree of spare capacity in the labour market and how this might ultimately affect inflationary pressures.’’
See, while the jobless rate has been falling steadily, the gains are concentrated at part-time work while participation rate continued to decline. Still, the RBA concluded that ‘’the overall assessment was that the risks around the inflation forecast were broadly balanced.’’
Last but not the least point is that the RBA is not as confident over Australia’s housing market as it was last month. It shared that ‘’While overall conditions had eased relative to 2015, some indicators had strengthened over the previous few months.’’ Specifically, housing prices significantly picked up in Sydney and Melbourne even though the impact of tighter lending conditions are visible in other areas.
Overall the RBA’s optimism over higher commodity prices shone through, and projected a bit of hawkishness that Aussie bulls had pounced on.
Widespread profit-taking – After consecutive days of gains, the Asian markets took a step back and were hit by a hit of profit-taking. Recall that traders have been pricing in a surge in fiscal stimulus for when Trump takes over as U.S. President, which had inspired broad and extended risk rallies across the board.
Australia’s A SX is down by 0.37%, Hang Seng edged 0.31% higher, Nikkei slipped by 0.06%, and the Shanghai Index sustained a 0.28% decline.
Profit-taking grips the Asian markets
The Greenback took small steps back against its major counterparts, as a bit of profit-taking dominated forex trading during the Asian session.
Major Events:
RBA’s meeting minutes – The Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) has just printed its meeting minutes after keeping its interest rates steady at 1.50% earlier this month. The central banks’ release has three key takeaways:
First, RBA Governor Lowe and his gang are doing cartwheels over the recent rise in commodity prices. They said that it’s lighting a fire under Australia’s trade numbers, at least enough for the RBA to revise their growth forecasts higher. Of course, it also didn’t hurt that economic conditions in China, Australia’s largest trading partner, have somewhat steadied.
Next, the RBA is worried that the improvements in the unemployment rate aren’t translating to overall growth in the jobs sector. It said that ‘’members observed that there was uncertainty about the degree of spare capacity in the labour market and how this might ultimately affect inflationary pressures.’’
See, while the jobless rate has been falling steadily, the gains are concentrated at part-time work while participation rate continued to decline. Still, the RBA concluded that ‘’the overall assessment was that the risks around the inflation forecast were broadly balanced.’’
Last but not the least point is that the RBA is not as confident over Australia’s housing market as it was last month. It shared that ‘’While overall conditions had eased relative to 2015, some indicators had strengthened over the previous few months.’’ Specifically, housing prices significantly picked up in Sydney and Melbourne even though the impact of tighter lending conditions are visible in other areas.
Overall the RBA’s optimism over higher commodity prices shone through, and projected a bit of hawkishness that Aussie bulls had pounced on.
Widespread profit-taking – After consecutive days of gains, the Asian markets took a step back and were hit by a hit of profit-taking. Recall that traders have been pricing in a surge in fiscal stimulus for when Trump takes over as U.S. President, which had inspired broad and extended risk rallies across the board.
Australia’s A SX is down by 0.37%, Hang Seng edged 0.31% higher, Nikkei slipped by 0.06%, and the Shanghai Index sustained a 0.28% decline.
(Discuss) Major events
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