Asia – Protesters Return to HK Streets

As the world begins to consider the second wave of Coronavirus infections, Chinese indexes were mixed this morning, the Shenzhen Composite gaining a tenth of a percent but the Shanghai Composite losing a half.

The Nikkei was marginally up, as was the Hang Seng. As Hong Kong police make dozens of arrests in renewed pro-democracy protests, consumer inflation for May in China fell to 2.4% YoY with the Producer Price index contracting by 3.7%.

Japan’s PPI also contracted by 0.4% MoM and consumer confidence in Australia was 6.3% in June.

Europe – Trouble on the Brexit Front

Most possibly anticipating US markets, all European benchmarks were in the red last night, led by the FTSE with a 2.11% contraction. Only Switzerland’s SMI gained a third of a percent.

Following Germany’s disappointing Trade Balance from April, France delivered a disappointing €-5.02 bn.

The Eurozone’s final GDP for Q1 pleased pundits by settling a tick above the previous reading at 03.1%. Employment improved slightly by 0.4% YoY.

Americas – ‘Merica in Recession

With Chinese companies putting on hold US listings, according to Reuters, US markets were mixed, the DOW losing a percent plus and the Nasdaq gaining just under a third.

The US Labour Department yesterday delivered a better-than-expected 5.046 mn new jobs as wholesale inventories also rose by 0.3%, and the NFIB Small Business Research Fund delivered a 4 point improvement in business confidence for May – 94.4 point.

Commodities – Oil Sinks on Inventories

Gold is back on the upswing as traders await tonight’s FOMC policy reading on yesterday’s news that the US had entered a recession in February.

Oil took a beating yesterday from the API, which announced an 8.42-million-barrel increase in inventories, hammering down the price of West Texas crude by 1.7% overnight to $38.28 a barrel.

Events