Here's my summary of the key news overnight in 90 seconds at 9 am, including news world markets are taking a breather.
The US Fed said in today's Beige Book report that the American economic expansion remained 'moderate' amid gains in manufacturing, housing and autos that offset weakness in defense-related industries in some regions.
Meanwhile banking giant, Bank of America disappointed investors with a modest profit report. It said it will under perform its peers because it is pursuing a less risky strategy.
In Europe, Germany's top central banker warned the region's debt crisis will take as much as a decade to overcome, dismissing the view expressed by some political leaders that the worst of the crisis is over.
Austerity may not be working, but there are also growing concerns that QE may be sowing its own seeds of destruction. More attention is turning to the consequences and to the problems that may arise as QE is scaled back.
In Australia, there are calls to end their carbon trading system, the one based on the seriously failing EU scheme. And from the "I did not know that" file, apparently emissions of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere in the US have fallen back to 1995 levels after they peaked in 2007.
In China, their central bank has signaled that they are about to increase the Yuan currency peg band as they transition to a market oriented basis.
Overnight markets for commodities treaded water with little change, but the Dow is down 1% in mid-day trade.
Following yesterday's tame CPI data, the Kiwi dollar starts today lower at 84.3 USc, 81.9 AUc, and our TWI is at 77.9.
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