Here's my summary of the key news overnight in 90 seconds at 8 am, including news of slowing factories in the US and China.
In the US, the snow is snarling more than flights. Although the latest ISM PMI survey showed that the manufacturing sector expanded in January for the eighth consecutive month, new orders fell sharply, down a whopping 13%.
This was a surprise to markets overnight and equities fell on the news. It is certainly a head-scratcher in the recent narrative about American factory expansion. The extended cold weather seems to get most of the blame. It was the energy, chemical and computer sectors who suffered most in the adjustment.
Gold is back up, oil is down again, and UST 10 yr benchmark bond yields are now down to 2.62%.
There was a slowing of factory output in China too, and Chinese service industries barely grew as well, mainly due to the real estate sector.
The NZX has said it has been registered in America by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, allowing US investors to trade options in a range of milk products including whole and skim milk powder for the first time. Previously, American investors could only participate in the NZX Dairy Futures Exchange via a third party. This will likely be quite a big deal for the NZX.
Still in the US, Janet Yellen is now formally the head of the US Federal Reserve, the first woman to take the post. It's also a very big deal. (Ben Bernanke is off the the Brookings Institution think tank.) At the same time, the battle starts anew for approval for the latest increase in the US debt limit.
And finally, some amazing new data here in New Zealand. Overnight it was revealed that January car sales here were stunning. 8,293 new cars were sold in January, a quarter of them SUVs, at a level not seen since the excessively frothy 1989. It is certainly the highest January ever recorded.
The NZ dollar starts today basically unchanged from yesterday at 81.0 USc, 92.3 AUc and the TWI is still at 76.7.
If you want to catch up with all the changes yesterday, we have an update here.
The easiest place to stay up with today's event risk is by following our Economic Calendar here »
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12 Comments
Meanwhile for a longer term view ie more than tomorrow, on how stable some of the World's countries are,
http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2014/02/03/3238781/deforestation-water…
Im thinking that Pakistan really is one of the countries to watch.
As opposed to how many new cars we bought, just which events is likely to impact us more?
regards
Karl Denninger on the US PMI:
http://market-ticker.org/akcs-www?post=228221
"This was a crap report and while people tried to blame it on weather the market isn't buying it (and neither am I.)"
And US stocks down more than 2% at the moment:
Two tired old oil fields in Texas get a shot of viagra.
http://www.aei-ideas.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/TexasOil1.jpg
Wall of oil gulf make likely Texas will start shipping oil to California and cut out the Saudis.
Looks like your normal slight of hand here.
That graph from your link doesnt say if its conventional oil that has shot up or another part of the "same field" but shale oil, in fact it just says Texas. So the increase could be anywhere and no, not conventiaonl so not a shot of viagra.
Got a complete link please?
Like Ive been saying for the last 2 or 3 weeks all you get is 2 to 4 years respite, then the inevitable drop off in output.
regards
Gas demand in transportation.
http://www.commodityonline.com/news/gas-demand-in-transportation-to-soa…
um.....well no....LOL
"Wood Mackenzie says that global gas demand in the transport sector is likely to grow to over 160 bcm by 2030, equivalent to 3mb/d of oil"
3mbpd? THREE? its expected that when crude oil drops off its production plateau this decade that the annual drop will be 4 to 10% per annum (and 18% is possible). That is 3mbpd up to 7 mbpd PER annum and its quite possible that the drop in the first 2 years could be more than 20% as we get back to the Hubbery curve.
So really 3mpbd ramp up over 16 years is negligable. In that time period its quite possible that there will be a transport fuel shortage of 30~50%.
If this is your idea of the free market working, oh dear...
regards
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