The data and events calendar is very light on Monday and Tuesday, but there are number of tier-one releases in the second half of the week, including Q1 Australian inflation (on Wednesday) and importantly US GDP (on Friday).
Monday 22nd April
Easter Monday
United States: Existing home sales (March)
Tuesday 23rd April
United States: New home sales (March)
Wednesday 24th April
Australia: CPI-inflation (Q1). Analysts expect headline CPI-inflation to have fallen to 1.5% yoy, its lowest rate since Q4 2017. An even lower figure could further intensify market’s pricing of RBA rate cuts.
Germany: German Ifo business climate index (April). The German ZEW economic sentiment index rose to +3.1 in April – the first positive print since March 2018 – and analysts expect the Ifo index to have also risen to a 3-month high of 99.9 in April. This would at the margin suggest that German economic activity picked up in early Q2 2019, even if overall GDP growth likely remained modest.
Thursday 25th April
United States: Durable goods orders (March)
Eurozone: ECB Board member De Guindos to speak
New Zealand: Trade balance (March). This is a pretty seasonal data series, with March typically recording modest surpluses or deficits.
Friday 26th April
Switzerland: Swiss National Bank Chairman Thomas Jordan to speak. With Swiss economic growth and inflation very modest the SNB is likely to take its cue from an increasingly dovish ECB. Jordan may comment on the impact of a weakening Swiss Franc on the Swiss economy.
United States: GDP growth (Q1, first reading). Consensus forecast is that GDP growth was unchanged from 2.2% qoq in Q4 2018 but the Atlanta Fed GDPNow estimate currently has GDP growth tracking at 2.8% in Q1. A stronger-than-expected GDP print would likely translate into markets trimming back their current expectations that the Federal Reserve will cut rates by 14bp in 2019 and support for the Dollar. But it may take more than a stronger first reading of GDP for markets to start thinking that the Fed could still hike rates this year.
