Later
this week we’ll get the People’s Bank of China setting the rate
on its Medium Term Lending Facility (MLF). The MLF will be set on
Thursday, the 15th. The chance of a cut to the rate, expected of
around 10 basis points for the one-year, is firming up with more
Chinese banks cutting deposit rates today following cuts from the
largest six state banks last week. The MLF sets the stage for Loan
Prime Setting (LPR) on the following Tuesday (the 20th).
Current
rates
are:
- MLF
one-year interest rate 2.75% - one-year
LPR 3.65% - the
five-year LPR 4.3%
The
yuan lost ground during the session, this is the offshore, USD/CNH:
Other
news was over the weekend. Goldman Sachs cut their Brent forecast,
again. The Saudis said OPEC+ is trying to address speculative
uncertainty and sentiment in the oil market. More in the bullet
points above on these.
The
economic data point of focus was that for wholesale-level Japanese
inflation, the PPI for May. This slipped further than expected.
The
USD added on points during the session, Yen was the most notable,
with USD/JPY rising from lows under 139.25 to above 139.60 as I post.
Asian
equity markets:
-
Japan’s Nikkei 225 +0.7%
-
China’s Shanghai Composite -0.4%
-
Hong Kong’s Hang Seng -0.6%
-
South Korea’s KOSPI -0.5%
-
Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 – Australia was out for a holiday today