Market Talk – May 28, 2021

Posted May 28, 2021 by Martin Armstrong |

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ASIA:

Despite a reasonable economic recovery, the giant Chinese economy will be bedeviled by serious problems, says a top corporate survey specializing in China. This 2021 China Corporate Payment Survey, made available to IANS, was conducted between February and April this year by COFACE, which surveyed over 600 companies across 13 broad sectors located in mainland China. The Chinese economy expanded by 2.3% in 2020, being the only major economy to record growth, and Coface expects the GDP to accelerate to 7.5 percent growth in 2021.

The major Asian stock markets had a mixed day today:

NIKKEI 225 increased 600.40 points or 2.10% to 29,149.41
Shanghai decreased 8.07 points or -0.22% to 3,600.78
Hang Seng increased 11.21 points or 0.04% to 29,124.41
ASX 200 increased 84.60 points or 1.19% to 7,179.50
Kospi increased 23.22 points or 0.73% to 3,188.73
SENSEX increased 307.66 points or 0.60% to 51,422.88
Nifty50 increased 97.80 points or 0.64% to 15,435.65

The major Asian currency markets had a negative day today:

AUDUSD decreased 0.00280 or -0.36% to 0.77123
NZDUSD decreased 0.00240 or -0.32% to 0.72605
USDJPY decreased 0.07400 or -0.07% to 109.77
USDCNY decreased 0.01670 or -0.26% to 6.36065

Precious Metals:

Gold increased 5.90 USD/t oz. or 0.31% to 1,901.98
Silver increased 0.02 USD/t. oz or 0.09% to 27.884

Some economic news from last night:

Japan:

Jobs/applications ratio (Apr) decreased from 1.10 to 1.09

Tokyo Core CPI (YoY) (May) remain the same at -0.2%

Tokyo CPI (YoY) (May) increased from -0.6% to -0.4%

CPI Tokyo Ex Food and Energy (MoM) (May) increased from -0.4% to 0.0%

Unemployment Rate (Apr) increased from 2.6% to 2.8%

Some economic news from today:

India:

FX Reserves, USD increased from 590.03B to 592.89B

Indonesia:

Motorbike Sales (YoY) (Apr) increased from -7.20% to 282.00%

EUROPE/EMEA:

The slump in business travel due to Covid-19 cost the UK economy £5.4 billion last week, a new study tracking the sector has estimated. The Business Travel Association (BTA) said there were 90% or 131,449 fewer trips than the same week of May 2019 across ten international and domestic air routes. It believes the weekly hit to UK GDP from international business travel is £4.4 billion, led by France at £778 million. A further £1 billion has been lost from domestic trips. The BTA describes business travel as a crucial economic enabler for the UK, contributing over £220 billion to UK GDP every year.

The major Europe stock markets had a green day:

CAC 40 increased 48.40 points or 0.75% to 6,484.11
FTSE 100 increased 2.94 points or 0.04% to 7,022.61
DAX 30 increased 113.25 points or 0.74% to 15,519.98

The major Europe currency markets had a mixed day today:

EURUSD increased 0.00120 or 0.09% to 1.22016
GBPUSD decreased 0.00040 or -0.03% to 1.41966
USDCHF increased 0.00220 or 0.25% to 0.89937

Some economic news from Europe today:

Norway:

Core Retail Sales (MoM) (Apr) increased from 0.0% to 0.3%

Unemployment Change (May) decreased from 127.44K to 115.17K

Unemployment Rate n.s.a. (May) decreased from 4.00% to 3.30%

Germany:

German Import Price Index (MoM) (Apr) decreased from 1.8% to 1.4%

German Import Price Index (YoY) (Apr) increased from 6.9% to 10.3%

France:

French Consumer Spending (MoM) (Apr) decreased from -0.3% to -8.3%

French CPI (YoY) increased from 1.2% to 1.4%

French CPI (MoM) increased from 0.1% to 0.3%

French GDP (QoQ) (Q1) decreased from 0.4% to -0.1%

French GDP (YoY) increased from -4.9% to 1.2%

French HICP (MoM) increased from 0.2% to 0,4%

French HICP (YoY) increased from 1.6% to 1.8%

French PPI (MoM) (Apr) decreased from 1.0% to -0.3%

Swiss:

KOF Leading Indicators (May) increased from 136.4 to 143.2

Spain:

Spanish Retail Sales (YoY) (Apr) increased from 14.3% to 41.0%

Spanish Business Confidence increased from -0.9 to 1.1

Italy:

Italian PPI (YoY) (Apr) increased from 2.7% to 6.5%

Italian PPI (MoM) (Apr) increased from 0.9% to 1.1%

Euro Zone:

Business and Consumer Survey (May) increased from 110.5 to 114.5

Business Climate (May) increased from 1.12 to 1.50

Consumer Confidence (May) increased from -8.1 to -5.1

Consumer Inflation Expectation (May) increased from 19.6 to 22.2

Selling Price Expectations (May) increased from 24.2 to 29.9

Services Sentiment (May) increased from 2.2 to 11.3

Industrial Sentiment (May) increased from 10.9 to 11.5

US/AMERICAS:

Inflation rose rapidly this April after the core personal consumption expenditures price index accelerated 3.1% YoY, the Commerce Department stated this Friday. Analysts had expected inflation to rise 2.9% last month. The Federal Reserve has targeted 2%, but has stated they would permit inflation to hover above their target for some time. The consumer price index (CPI) rose 4.2% in April.

Under the 2020 CARES Act, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) issued nearly 168 million stimulus checks totaling $280 billion. However, the IRS mistakenly sent about 4.5 million checks to individuals who did not meet the requirements, including people who are no longer living. After urging the public to return the checks, the Treasury received nearly 60,000 payments back from deceased Americans, saving the department $72 million. So far, $80 million in stimulus checks have been returned.

US Market Closings:

Dow advanced 64.81 points or 0.19% to 34,529.45
S&P 500 advanced 3.23 points or 0.08% to 4,204.11
Nasdaq advanced 12.46 points or 0.09% to 13,748.74
Russell 2000 declined 4.1 points or -0.18% to 2,268.97

Canada Market Closings:

TSX Composite advanced 77.77 points or 0.39% to 19,852.18
TSX 60 advanced 5.24 points or 0.44% to 1,189.6

Brazil Market Closing:

Bovespa advanced 1,194.8 points or 0.96% to 125,561.36

ENERGY:

The oil markets had a mixed day today:

Crude Oil decreased 0.51 USD/BBL or -0.76% to 66.3400
Brent increased 0.14 USD/BBL or 0.20% to 69.6000
Natural gas increased 0.027 USD/MMBtu or 0.91% to 2.9850
Gasoline decreased 0.0208 USD/GAL or -0.97% to 2.1310
Heating oil decreased 0.0173 USD/GAL or -0.84% to 2.0391

The above data was collected around 14:35 EST on Friday

Top commodity gainers: Palm Oil (2.40%), Coffee (4.18%), Coal (2.35%) and Steel (2.06%)
Top commodity losers: Aluminum (-1.62%), Corn (-1.32%), Feeder Cattle (-1.05%), and Wheat (-1.85%)

The above data was collected around 14:45 EST on Friday.

BONDS:

Japan 0.0870%(+1bp), US 2’s 0.1406%(-0.01%), US 10’s 1.5807%(-2.93bps); US 30’s 2.2632%(-0.03%), Bunds -0.1840% (-1.2bp), France 0.175% (-1bp), Italy 0.9145% (-2.16bp), Turkey 17.83% (+22bp), Greece 0.8370% (-4bp), Portugal 0.469% (-1.6bp); Spain 0.479% (-0.74bp) and UK Gilts 0.802% (-1bp).