Good Morning ,
- FX traded in narrow ranges overnight but with risk- and commodity currencies
leading the market. Key event will be today's FOMC meeting, where they
also release their projections followed by a press conference of chairman
Bernanke.
- Stocks: Nikkei +0.89 %, Hang seng +0.05 %, Shanghai Composite 0.33 %,
Dow Jones +0.58 %, S+P500 +0.37 %
- Bundesbank President Jens Weidmann defended the European Central Bank's
strategy to urge governments toward more fiscal austerity amid a deepening
recession and political crises, the Wall Street Journal reported. "The crisis
can only be solved by embarking on often-painful structural reforms and
following up on fiscal consolidation," Weidmann told the newspaper. "If
policy makers think they can avoid this, they will try to. That's why the
pressure has to be kept up." Weidmann said he he hasn't seen "any convincing
reason for myself to embark on a third" three-year refinancing operation,
the Journal reported.
- ECB Costa said the Euro Area faces liquidity and insolvency imbalances and
lacks a plan for political integration. The European Union must equip itself
with "instruments of stability," Costa, who also heads the Bank of Portugal,
said. EU countries must adopt a new model to manage public finances, he said.
- Spain's central government deficit reaches 1.85% in Q1 vs 1.06% a year ago
- Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao said the country will maintain steady growth even
amid signs the world's second-largest economy is slowing.
- The growth rate will be slightly higher than first quarter, Zhu Hongren,
spokesman for the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology said at a
briefing in Beijing today.
- The Chinese government has been pressing ahead with reforms to the country's
currency regime, vice foreign minister Cui Tiankai said on Wednesday. Cui
told a media briefing ahead of the annual Strategic and Economic Dialogue
between China and the United States that the yuan exchange rate has been
increasingly decided by market forces, repeating a phrase used repeatedly
recently by government leaders and top central bank officials.
- 1430 US Durable Goods Orders Mar
- 1830 US FOMC Rate Decision
- 2000 FOMC to release projections of economy and Fed funds rate
- 2015 Fed Bernanke Press Conference
- 0900 ECB Draghi
- 0930 ECB Mersch
- 1100 Germany Economy Ministry releases new macro economic forecasts
- 1115 ECB Constancio
- 1545 ECB's Mersch, Constancio, Visco
- 1800 German Chancellor Merkel
- 1030 UK GDP Q1 A
- 1030 UK Index of Services Feb
- 1200 UK CBI Trends Total Orders Apr
- 1200 UK CBI Trends Selling Prices Apr
- 1200 UK CBI Business Optimism Apr
(CET)
Have a nice day !