Here's my summary of the key news overnight in 90 seconds at 9 am, including news that there has been a shock resignation at one of the world's biggest miners.
Tom Albanese, an American who ran Rio Tinto, has quit under pressure from his board after the company was forced to take huge writedowns on its coal and aluminium assets - about US$14 billion is 'lost', and remember this is the second time this has happened.
It's that aluminium connection which affects us - Rio Tinto owns the Bluff smelter, and many have wondered how committed they are to that plant. Maybe less now. An Aussie who runs Rio's iron ore business is taking over.
Oil is rising sharply in price this morning - it is over US$95/barrel, and at the same time the US dollar is strengthening, and the Dow is up in mid-day trade, up over 13,600 and within a few percent now of its all-time high of 14,200.
The number of American filing for jobless claims hit a five year low, and housing starts and building consents in the US were very strong in December, at almost five year highs. This data is important for New Zealand because the American consumer is still the driver of world trade, which to a large extent means Chinese exports.
China is doing its bit for growth too - it has embarked on another round if infrastructure "investment" and its slowdown is clearly ending. We should get Chinese data on 2012 GDP growth later today which may confirm the extent of that past slowdown.
In Indonesia, flooding in the capital Jakarta has brought that city to a virtual halt. Flooding is a regular monsoon risk there but this year it has been particularly difficult.
In Australia, the latest jobs numbers were weak - weak again we should say, because they were in 2011 as well. This makes them the worst since 1997, fifteen years ago. Working hours are being cut.
Later this morning we get local inflation data for December, which is expected to remain modest.
The NZ$ starts today virtually unchanged at 84.0 USc, although we are edging up against the Aussie to 79.8 AUc; the TWI is at 75.5.
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