Nikkei rises amid various holidays in Asia

Asia Market Update: Nikkei rises amid various holidays in Asia; RBA minutes due tomorrow; Elon Musk tweet sends Bitcoin on a bender again.

General trend

- Markets trade quietly with Australia, China, Hong Kong and Taiwan closed; major currencies quiet as well.

- G7 wraps up the weekend vowing to continue to support economies with investment until pandemic subsidies, all agree inflation seen recently is temporary. Some concern over China trade practices.

- Japan and South Korea fail to meet on sidelines of G7 after Korea's plans to hold defense drills.

- See more production shutdowns from Hyundai due to chip shortages.

- Toshiba board set for a shake up after investigation finds malfeasance.

- Iraq oil ministers sees H2 oil at $68-75/bbl, WTI rises to $71.29.

- Looking RBA Gov Lowe is due to speak on Jun 17th (Thurs) [title of speech is ‘From Recovery to Expansion’].

Headlines/Economic data

Australia/New Zealand

- ASX 200 closed for holiday.

- (NZ) NZIER quarterly Survey of economists: Raises 2021/22 and 2022/23 GDP forecasts, cuts 2023/24 GDP forecast; raises inflation forecasts across the projection; raises 90-day bank bill rate forecasts.

- (AU) Australia PM Morrison calls for patience on UK free trade agreement (FTA), not worried if one is not signed Tuesday, still remains apart on agriculture - AFR.

- (AU) Australia Trade Min: Wrote to China trade min in January, and I am still waiting for a response; PM Morrison: we are ready to come to the table and talk about how the countries can work together - SCMP citing G7 comments.

Japan

- Nikkei 225 opened +0.7%.

- 6502.JP Second largest shareholder, 3D Investment Partners calling for chairman and 3 directors to resign after investigation finds malfeasance – press.

- (JP) US President Biden expressed his support for Japan to go ahead with Olympics - Nikkei.

- (JP) Japan unilaterally canceled a meeting between South Korean President Moon and Japan PM Suga on sidelines of G7; Japan canceled meeting because of South Korea holding military drills - Yonhap.

- (JP) Japan Chief Cabinet Sec Kato: Govt will carefully decide on lifting the state of emergency with expert opinion.

- (JP) Japan Apr Final Industrial Production M/M: 2.9% v 2.5% prelim; Y/Y: 15.8% v 15.4% prelim.

Korea

- Kospi opened 0.0%

- 068270.KR Phase 3 trial shows antibody COVID-19 treatment, Rekirona, to be safe and effective.

- 005380.KR Will temporarily halt production in the US due to chip shortages and maintenance – Yonhap.

China/Hong Kong

- Hang Seng and Shanghai Composite closed for holiday.

- 1211.HK Says it is talking to Xiaomi regarding auto partnership.

Other

- (SG) Singapore Central Bank (MAS) Survey: Economists see 2021 CPI at 1.4% (prior 0.9%); GDP at 6.5% (prior 5.8%).

- (G7) G7 Communique: Agree need to continue support economies for as long as necessary, shifting focus towards job creation and infrastructure investment, once recovery is firmly established need to work on repairing public finances, generally agreed inflation was temporary.

- (IQ) Iraq Oil Min Jabbar: Expect oil prices to be $68-75/bbl in second half of 2021 due to commitment to OPEC+ output cut - speaking from Baghdad International Book Fair.

North America

- TSLA Musk: "This is inaccurate. Tesla only sold ~10% of holdings to confirm BTC could be liquidated easily without moving market. When there’s confirmation of reasonable (~50%) clean energy usage by miners with positive future trend, Tesla will resume allowing Bitcoin transactions." – tweet.

- (G7) White House: G7 agree to new global infrastructure initiative dubbed 'Build Back Better World (B3W) to rival China's 'Belt & Road' initiative.

Europe

- (UK) Govt approves delay of 4 weeks to COVID lockdown measures - UK press.

- BNP.FR In dispute with Europe’s largest wine exporter, J. Garcia Carrion, over "inappropriate" currency transactions with a cumulative notional amount of tens of billions of euros – FT.

- (DE) Germany CDU leader Laschet said to prefer a coalition with Free Democrats, rejects tax increases and minimum hourly wage of €12/hr – press.

- (UK) UK Govt expected to reduce Google, Amazon and Samsung’s bargaining power with broadcasters, via legislative action - UK press.

Levels as of 01:00ET

- Hang Seng closed; Shanghai Composite closed; Kospi +0.0%; Nikkei225 +0.6%; ASX 200 closed.

- Equity Futures: S&P500 +0.1%; Nasdaq100 +0.2%, Dax +0.0%; FTSE100 +0.3%.

- EUR 1.2112-1.2094; JPY 109.83-109.64; AUD 0.7711-0.7693; NZD 0.7146-0.7130.

- Commodity Futures: Gold -0.7% at $1,866/oz; Crude Oil +0.5% at $71.23/brl; Copper -0.6% at $4.53/lb.