Review

  • Baltic prices continued to fall in August. Read our comment.

  • Yesterday, Czech GDP data for both Q1 and Q2 were revised down sharply. The Czech economy contracted by 5.5% y/y in the second quarter, much more than the previous flash estimate of 4.9% y/y. Further, Q1 GDP was substantially downgraded to -4.5% y/y from previously -3.4% y/y. The detailed breakdown showed the main reason for the major decline in Q2 GDP to be an investment and inventory slump. Foreign trade contributed negatively but only slightly. Surprisingly, household consumption still had a positive impact on Q2 GDP data.

  • Flash estimate for Hungarian industrial production showed 19.4% y/y fall in July. The decline disappointed coming as it did after an 18.8% y/y fall in June and was worse than the consensus forecast of -17.7% y/y. The recovery in Hungarian industry remains fragile.

  • Turkish industrial production for July declined 9.2% y/y. This was slightly worse than the consensus expectation of a 9.0% y/y fall but better than our forecast 11.6% y/y lower production. Prospectively, we expect a further improvement in Turkish industrial activity.


Preview

• Czech inflation for August will confirm the absence of any real inflationary pressure in the country. We forecast an increase of 0.4% y/y, slightly higher than the consensus rise of 0.3% y/y and the July increase, also of 0.3% y/y. 


Trading update

  • Risk appetite sparked by the G20 meeting persisted throughout the market’s Tuesday session. Most EMEA FX performed fairly well despite the fact that much EMEA regional economic data published on Tuesday were disappointing. High risk appetite together with gold prices breaking the US$1,000 /oz level pushed the rand to a 2009 high vs. USD.

  • Yesterday we published a trade recommendation to buy PLN/CZK – read here