Asian shares all in red: Japan's Nikkei -2.61%

Good Morning,

- The euro rebound as investors took profits on the dollar's recent gains, ahead of a policy review by the ECB.

- Asian shares all in red: Japan's Nikkei -2.61%, Korea's Kospi -0.77%, Australia's ASX 200 -0.67%.

- The dollar index dropped about 0.4 percent to 85.630, pulling away from a four-year high of 86.218 touched on Tuesday.

- The European Central Bank will present details today of a new asset-buying plan with which it hopes to revive the flagging euro zone economy and see off the specter of deflation. The ECB plans to buy asset-backed securities (ABS) - packages of re parceled loans - with a view to spurring the market for such credit and supporting lending to the small- and mid-sized firms that form the backbone of the euro zone economy.

- ECB’s President Mario Draghi said Wednesday the ECB is obliged to return Eurozone inflation to close to 2%, and urged governments to do their part to restore confidence. Speaking the eve of the ECB's monthly policy meeting, Draghi said, "As policymakers in Italy and in the euro area, it often feels like we face a Herculean task to revive growth and bring down unemployment. And just like Hercules confronting the hydra, it sometimes seems as though just as we defeat one challenge - such as the sovereign debt crisis - two new challenges spring up - such as low inflation and a weak recovery. "We face both a cyclical challenge, which is too low demand, and a structural challenge, which is too low potential growth," Draghi said. "And it is only by addressing each challenge at the same time that we can generate a sustained recovery; that we can ensure that no new 'heads' spring up. This means each institution doing its job and sticking to its commitments."

- Bank of America on EUR/USD: The ECB will not disappoint, which means the Euro will remain weak. "As we do not expect the ECB to disappoint this week, we also do not expect the Euro to strengthen. Our baseline scenario of constructive ambiguity will not have much of an impact on the EUR, in our view. However, we also see a risk that the ECB may try to offset the market disappointment from the low first TLTRO by threatening more decisive action if needed, as we discussed above. This could be negative for the Euro in the short term," BofA argues. "We continue expecting a gradual weakening of EUR/USD, to 1.25 by the end of 2014 and 1.20 by the end of 2015," BofA projects.

- BOE’s Broadbent says UK is still not ready for rate hike.

- The Japanese yen held its gains against the dollar on Thursday after weak manufacturing surveys from around the globe triggered a run on risk. German factory activity shrank for the first time in 15 months, China's manufacturing sector barely grew, and the United States slowed more than expected, data showed yesterday. The dollar retreated to 108.65 yen from the previous session's six-year peak of 110.09.

- Russian central bank chief says rumors of capital controls are baseless. Limits on capital flows would push Russia back years. No limits on capital flows is key achievement. Russia has reserves to ensure stability. Easing monetary policy would only boost CPI. Sees some cyclical factors in GDP slowdown. Russia must focus on investment environment. Russia facing decrease in external demand.

- Watch today: ECB monetary announcement, US jobless, UK construction.

Have a nice Day !