Here's my summary of the key news overnight in 90 seconds at 9 am, including news of odd market reactions to news out of China.
The keenly awaited HSBC Flash China PMI came in late yesterday below expectations, negative and with its fourth decline in a row and an eight month low - and a faster rate of decrease. All bad. The Aussie dollar fell, and then recovered, then made substantial gains in value. The Kiwi dollar showed little impact. Shanghai wholesale rates hardly moved.
No-one seems to care. Why? Well it seems this result makes it more likely China will announce more stimulus. Go figure.
Perhaps markets should take more notice. China's rate of urbanisation is slowing, undermining a key plank for this and future year's growth targets. If both manufacturing and urbanisation keep slowing, it will be much harder for the country to achieve this year's 7.5% growth.
However, all this justifies the recent weakeness in the yuan's exchange rate
Gold fell, and it has fallen rather sharply, and is down to $1,310/oz. That is a spectacular 6% fall in a week.
And then the American markets returned from their weekend break reporting strong manufacturing expansion although at a marginally slower rate.
The eurozone PMI was also out overnight and was stable and positive, on the back of continuing good German results and surprisingly strong French results.
A couple of emerging nations reviewed official rates recently. Vietnam surprised with a 0.5% cut, and Israel made no change.
Oil prices treaded water; equities are lower in mid-afternoon trade in New York. The UST 10 yr benchmark yield is at 2.74%.
The NZ Dollar had an uneventful session overnight and starts today at 85.4 USc, although it is down against the Aussie at 93.4 AUc and the TWI is still at at 79.9.
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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