Marketmind: Rehash on rates ahead as ECB, BOE and Fed speak
2023.05.19 02:19
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© Reuters. FILE PHOTO: Flowers are seen outside the Bank of England in the City of London financial district in London, Britain May 11, 2023. REUTERS/Henry Nicholls
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A look at the day ahead in European and global markets from Vidya Ranganathan
Several key central bankers, including Fed Chair Jerome Powell, appear at a variety of events today, ensuring investors have plenty of commentary, and nearly similar synopses.
The Bank of England’s Jonathan Haskel is up first. The messaging from the BOE after last week’s 12th rate rise has been consistent: It isn’t done, the labour market is tight, quantitative tightening might even pick up pace.
Sterling has been heaved around by weak economic data and the central bank’s hawkishness, but is reacting more to broader U.S. dollar strength around Washington’s debt ceiling talks this week.
As the week draws to a close, global markets are optimistic and bullish – optimistic that a U.S. debt default will be avoided and bullish that markets can withstand the rise in bond yields sparked by the latest wave of hawkish Fed-speak.
Wall Street, Treasury yields, implied U.S. interest rates and the dollar all rose on Thursday.
The dollar has also been the driver of the ‘s latest decline to 7 to the dollar, and of moves in the yen, whose weakness has become another tailwind for Japanese stocks – now at their highest since August 1990 when markets were caught up in the country’s “bubble” era.
The ECB’s Isabel Schnabel speaks later in the day, but has also been steady in her message that the European Central Bank will keep raising borrowing costs until it sees core inflation decline sustainably and that market expectations for rate cuts are misplaced.
G7 leaders kicked off a three-day summit in Hiroshima on Friday, and the focus there is on fresh sanctions against Russia and what they say about China.
Key developments that could influence markets on Friday:
– G7 leaders summit (Japan)
SPEECHES/EVENTS
– ECB’s Isabel Schnabel (1600 GMT), BOE’s Jonathan Haskel (0945 GMT)
– Fed Chair Jerome Powell (1500 GMT), Governor Michelle Bowman, New York Fed President John Williams (1245 GMT)
