The US dollar weakened again overnight to near its lowest level this year. Australia’s inflation figures today will be dominated by Government subsidies lowering electricity prices. There’s welcome news for the Bank of Japan in producer price inflation figures.
In our bonus deep dive interview, ANZ’s Agriculture Economist Susan Kilsby explains what’s behind the recent rise in dairy prices that has led ANZ Research to boost its NZ farmgate price forecast.
5 things to know:
The US dollar index weakened about 0.2% overnight to near its lowest level this year, while stocks firmed as US Consumer confidence rose slightly to a six month-high of 103.3 in August. The measure is still down from 111 at the start of the year, indicating a more cautious attitude to spending, says ANZ Head of G3 Economics Brian Martin.
In Australia today, the July partial CPI indicator is expected to fall to 3.3% from 3.8% in June as the effect of electricity rebates shows through. ANZ Senior Economist Catherine Birch says the effect of those temporary rebates will mean headline CPI isn’t going to be a good reflection of the underlying state of play over the next year or so.
ANZ Roy Morgan Australian Consumer Confidence was little changed in the past week, easing 0.4 points. ANZ Economist Maddy Dunk says there were positive signals in the survey’s inflation expectations measure.
Maddy says another interesting nugget from this release was a continuing rise in confidence among renters - it’s now higher than for those those paying off a home loan.
The prices that Japan’s services producers receive rose 2.8% in the year to July - slightly below expectations and the previous month.However, ANZ FX Analyst Felix Ryan says the rate of growth in the PPI remains historically high, which will support the Bank of Japan’s tightening bias.
Cheers
Bernard
PS: Catch you tomorrow with analysis of those Australian inflation figures.
