Markets Overview

Less than 2 weeks after Hurricane Harvey devastated manyparts of Houston, Texas, the US will endure the wrath ofanother, Hurricane Irma, which has made landfall in theFlorida keys on Sunday (10 Sep). This is the first time US hasbeen hit by back-to-back hurricanes since 1964, and officialswarned that Irma could be worse than 1992’s HurricaneAndrew. Into the new week, there is no Fed official speakingin public forum as the Fed Reserve enters into its one-week“blackout period” ahead of its 19/20 Sep FOMC meeting anddecision. Central bank focus will instead be on the monetarypolicy decisions of the Swiss National Bank (SNB) and theBank of England (BOE) both on Thurs (14 Sep) and bothare expected to keep status quo. Key US August data willbe the PPI (13 Sep), CPI (14 Sep), University of Michiganconsumer sentiment survey and the advance retail sales(both on 15 Sep). On the US corporate calendar, attentionwill be on Apple which will host a new products launch eventat the Steve Jobs Theater on 12 Sep. As for the UK, there willbe the August CPI, RPI & PPI data (12 Sep), August joblessclaims and July employment data (13 Sep) and Augustretail sales (14 Sep). On Monday (11 Sep), UK parliamentis set to vote on Brexit’s Repeal Bill and Brexit SecretaryDavid Davis warned UK lawmakers ahead of the vote thatif they block this key piece of domestic legislation, it maylead to a “chaotic” departure from the EU. This legislation iscontentious as it contains so-called Henry VIII powers thatallow ministers to make changes to existing laws, bypassingnormal scrutiny by Parliament.

    On Monday (11 Sep), Japan’s July machine orders reboundedstrongly by 8.0%m/m, (-7.5%y/y) from -1.9%m/m, (-5.2%y/y)in June, versus the Bloomberg median forecast was +4.2%m/m, (-7.3%y/y) while the August M2 money supply grew by4%y/y (from 4.0%y/y in June and in line with Bloombergmedian forecast of 4.1%y/y). The rest of the data docketfor the developed economies is very light with the key onesbeing Bank of France Ind. Sentiment survey for August andItalian July industrial production data. There is no key USdata today and attention will be on the damage inflicted tothe US state of Florida in the aftermath of Hurricane Irma.

    It will be a light day for Asian data today as the key datatoday will be Malaysia’s July industrial production (exp: 5.0%y/y, prev: 4.0% y/y).

    Tomorrow (12 Sep), Indonesia will be reporting both AugustCPI (exp: 3.23% y/y, prev: 2.36% y/y) and July industrialproduction (exp: 1.7% y/y, prev: -0.1% y/y). The Philippineswill release July unemployment and imports/exports data,while South Korea will report July money supply and Augustbank lending to households. Singapore will also report July retail sales. Malaysia’s Prime Minister Najib will begin a 3-day visit to the United States at the invitation of US PresidentDonald Trump. The last time Malaysia was granted a WhiteHouse visit was in 2004 under former PM Badawi. This willbe Najib’s first White House visit and making him the secondSoutheast Asian leader to visit the White House under theTrump administration, after Vietnamese PM Nguyen XuanPhuc.