Asian session seen amid Japanese holiday and dearth of major weekend news

Asia Market Update: Lethargic Asian session seen amid Japanese holiday and dearth of major weekend news; US bank earnings due at the end of week.

General trend

- US equity FUTs pared drop.

- Only slight FX moves seen amid Japanese holiday; USD index rises after prior drop.

- UST FUTs extend declines.

- US Natural Gas FUTS rise by >5%.

- Hang Seng has traded modestly higher [Banks and Tech firms rise].

- Shanghai Composite traded slightly higher during the morning session [IT index rebounded].

- S&P ASX 200 reversed the opening gain [REIT and Consumer indices drop amid higher bond yields].

- PBOC made first net OMO cash injection of 2022.

- Companies due to report during the NY morning include Commercial Metals, Tilray.

Headlines/Economic Data

Australia/New Zealand

- ASX 200 opened +0.1%.

- (AU) AUSTRALIA NOV BUILDING APPROVALS M/M: 3.6% V 3.0%E, Private Sector Houses Approvals M/M: 1.4% v +4.3% prior.

- (AU) Australia Dec Melbourne Institute Inflation M/M: 0.2% v 0.3% prior; Y/Y: 2.8% v 3.1% prior.

- (AU) Australia PM Morrison: Too early to determine omicron impact on economy; notes some dampening of consumer demand.

- (AU) New daily COVID cases in Australia top 100K for the first time, total mow 1.0M - press.

Japan

- Nikkei 225 closed for holiday

- 9984.JP Said to be close to becoming major shareholder in UK's PrimaryBid in $150M funding round - UK press.

Korea

- Kospi opened -0.3%.

- 005380.KR COO Munoz: Targeting to have 40-50% of US car sales to be eco-friendly by 2030 – Yonhap.

China/Hong Kong

- Hang Seng opened +0.1%; Shanghai Composite opened -0.2%.

- (CN) China Govt of South China's Guangdong Province has held meetings with a number of property enterprises, likely paving the way for state-owned real estate enterprises to carry out M&A with troubled property firms - Chinese press.

- (CN) China will make it easier for state backed property developers to buy up distressed assets of property developers.

- (CN) Some talk that China PBOC could roll out its digital yuan (CBDC) on a wider scale in a few weeks (currently in pilot mode) ahead of Lunar New year – press.

- (CN) China city of Tianjin to require residents traveling out of the city to have nucleic acid testing in the past 48 hours (following first community spread case of omicron) – press.

- (CN) China PBOC sets Yuan reference rate: 6.3653 v 6.3742 prior.

- (CN) China PBOC Open Market Operation (OMO): Sells CNY10B in 7-day reverse repos v CNY10B prior; Net injects CNY10B v drain CNY100B prior.

- 2628.HK Discloses disciplinary review of chairman and executive director Wang Bin.

- 1107.HK Appoints financial advisers, in talks with relevant note holds on possible debt restructuring, shares to resume trading today; debt securities to remain halted until further notice

Other

- 2330.TW Expect FY22 to have $5.4B in prepayments, guides FY21 Rev to be at record levels - Taiwan press.

North America

- (US) Sen Manchin (D-WV) appears to be pulling back support for Build Back Better, thought to have privately said he is not interested in approving the legislation – US press (in line with Jan 4th).

Europe

- (US) Sec of State Blinken: Not expecting any major breakthrough in talks with Russia on Ukraine this week – press.

- IMF: Expect global recovery to continue in 2022 and 2023 period but risks remain elevated by the resurgent pandemic.

Levels as of 00:15ET

- Hang Seng +0.8%; Shanghai Composite +0.2%; Kospi -1.0%; Nikkei225 closed for holiday; ASX 200 -0.1%.

- Equity Futures: S&P500 +0.1%; Nasdaq100 +0.3%, Dax +0.0%; FTSE100 +0.1%.

- EUR 1.1361-1.1333; JPY 115.86-115.54; AUD 0.7198-0.7171; NZD 0.6782-0.6767.

- Commodity Futures: Gold -0.3% at $1,791/oz; Crude Oil +0.2% at $79.02/brl; Copper -0.1% at $4.39/lb.