Capital Markets: "The Dollar is Sold through CNY7.0 as Chinese Equities Continue to Rally"

From Marc to Market:

Overview: Investors continue to clamor into risk assets. Led by Chinese shares, the MSCI Asia Pacific Index pushed higher for the third session this week to new five-month highs. Europe's Dow Jones Stoxx 600 is trying to snap a two-day decline with the help of better than expected revenues for its largest tech company. US shares are little changed after yesterday's 0.8% rally in the S&P 500 and new record high close in the NASDAQ. Bonds are sidelined. Asia Pacific yields edged higher, but mostly flat in Europe. The US 10-year benchmark is hovering around 65 bp. The dollar is on its back foot, trading heavily against most major and emerging market currencies. Sterling and the Swedish krona led the majors with a 0.20-0.25% gain through the European morning. The dollar punched below CNY7.0 for the first time in almost four months. Gold is holding above $1800 an ounce and looks set to push higher above $1818 seen yesterday. Oil is little changed as the August WTI contract is confined to a narrow range (~$40.60-$41.00)

Asia Pacific
As widely anticipated, China's CPI firmed to 2.5% in June from 2.4%. This was in line with expectations. Food prices are still an important culprit. They are up over 11% year-over-year. The 81.6% increase in pork prices accounts for 2.05 percentage points of CPI. Non-food prices rose 0.3% year-over-year. Producer prices showed somewhat less deflation. PPI fell 3% year-over-year after a 3.7% decline in May. We anticipate more stimulus, but it may be targeted rather than broadly delivered.

Japan reported core machinery tool orders rose 1.7% in May. It follows a 12% slump in April. Economists had projected another decline. The rise in new orders was driven by the service sector, which underscores the weakness in the manufacturing sector seen in other economic reports. Manufacturing orders fell.

Home loan values fell by 11.6% in Australia. This was more than twice the decline expected by the median forecast in the Bloomberg survey. It is the third decline in the past four months. Meanwhile, tensions are rising between Australia and China. It suspended the extradition treaty with Hong Kong while seeking to draw Hong Kong residents that want to flee in light of the new security lows, and have begun strengthening its ability to resist Beijing's cyber attacks....

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