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Danske Bank A/S
Market Movers
We expect the Sentix investor confidence for February to follow the direction from January and decrease once again due to the continued global market uncertainty. If this uncertainty persists, it could end up being a drag on economic growth in 2016. In this case, we would have to revise our forecast of a reacceleration in growth.
We are also due to get data on German industrial production for December today, which we expect to increase slightly on the back of the pickup in new orders. Moreover, several key economic variables indicate a solid domestic demand, which would be supportive for industrial production.
In Denmark, foreign trade data and balance of payment data for December are scheduled for release today.
Selected Market News
Chinese FX reserve data for January published yesterday showed that People’s Bank of China (PBoC) made FX intervention for USD98bn in support of the CNY. That leaves China’s FX reserve at the lowest level since 2012. Although intervention was slightly smaller than in December it marked another month of significant depreciation pressure on the CNY.
In our view, the US jobs report released on Friday generally brought good news, even though the headline was weaker than expected. Employment grew by 151,000 in January, significantly lower than employment growth in Q4 (which was also revised down) but trend growth still seems solid, in our view.
With respect to our current Fed call, today's release was no smoking gun. A smoking gun could be when Fed chair Janet Yellen speaks on Wednesday. This is the first time we will hear from her since the Fed increased the target range in December and we will listen carefully to hear what she has to say.
The weekly US oil rig count dropped to 467 last week. It has not been this low since 2010, which means that the boost in US oil rig count during the boom in shale oil production has been more-or-less reversed and it is now at less than a third compared to the peak in 2014. The decline in the oil price is thus taken its toll on investment and future production.
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