It’s another heavy political week for the UK with a number of parliamentary votes on Brexit due to take place. In the US, it is the macro data agenda which will likely garner markets’ attention, with retail sales, ISM PMI data, durable goods and labour market figures due for release. In Australia the RBA holds its policy meeting, with the question whether it follows the RBNZ down an outright dovish route.
Monday 1st April
Switzerland: Retail sales (February). Retail sales contracted 0.2% yoy in February, the fourth consecutive monthly contraction.
United Kingdom: Manufacturing PMI (March). This index of economic activity in the manufacturing sector jumped three big figures to a one-year high of 55.1 in March.
Eurozone: CPI-inflation (March). Core and headline CPI-inflation fell to 0.8% yoy and 1.4% yoy, respectively, from 1.0% and 1.5% yoy in February. Inflation in the Eurozone remains very muted, under-pinning the ECB’s recent dovish turn.
United Kingdom: The Lower House of parliament (House of Commons) will again hold a number of indicative votes to ascertain whether there is a majority of MPs in favour of an alternative scenario to Prime Minister May’s draft Brexit deal.
United States: Retail sales (February). Retail sales rebounded a meagre 0.2% mom in January following a 1.2% mom drop in December 2018 and analysts forecast a further rise of 0.3% mom in February.
United States: ISM Manufacturing PMI (March). Analysts forecast that this measure of manufacturing activity was unchanged in March at a 27-month low of 54.2
Tuesday 2nd April
Australia: Reserve Bank of Australia policy meeting. The RBA has so far adopted a broadly neutral policy stance but markets will be looking for any signs that the RBA has or will move in the RBNZ’s direction by flagging a possible policy rate cut.
Switzerland: CPI-inflation (March). Headline CPI-inflation was unchanged at a 12-month low of 0.6% yoy in February and analysts expect an unchanged number in March. With Swiss inflation hovering near zero percent, it is not inconceivable that the Swiss National Bank follows the ECB’s lead by indicating a more dovish monetary policy stance.
United Kingdom: The government may try to hold a second parliamentary vote on the Withdrawal Agreement which was voted down last week by a majority of 58 MPs. Should parliament fail to vote in favour of this Plan A or an alternative Plan B, the UK would face the possibility of exiting the EU without a deal on 12th April.
United States: Durable goods order (February).
Wednesday 3rd April
Australia: Retail sales and trade balance (February). Markets may still be digesting the RBA’s policy meeting statement and press conference and thus perhaps not pay as much as attention as normal to these two data releases.
Eurozone: Retail sales (February)
United Kingdom: Services PMI (March). This is normally an important data release for an economy where the service sector accounts for about 70% of GDP but with Brexit hogging the headlines its impact on UK financial markets may be minimal. The service sector PMI has been edging lower since early 2017 and analysts forecast a further fall to 51.0 in March from 51.3 in February.
United States: ADP private sector employment (March). Job creation in the US has remained strong despite cooling GDP growth but there have been some recent signs of a marginal cooling in the labour market.
United States: FOMC members Bostic and Kashkari to speak.
United States: ISM non-manufacturing PMI (March).
Thursday 4th April
Eurozone: European Central Bank to publish minutes of its March monetary policy meeting at which it announced that it no longer planned to hike policy rates this year.
United States: FOMC Mester and Williams to speak.
Friday 5th April
Germany: Industrial output (February)
United States: Labour market data (March). The rise in non-farm payrolls collapsed to just 20,000 in February, the lowest since September 2017 when two hurricanes hit the US. The view last month was that this was one-off fall and analysts expect a more “normal” 175,000 jobs to have been created in March.
United States: FOMC member Bostic to speak
