In Australia, the week sees minutes from the RBA’s last rate setting meeting released, along with a speech by Governor Glenn Stevens: both on Tuesday.
Both are likely to reinforce the message that while the Bank still retains a bias to easing interest rates; Mr Stevens’ comments will be examined to see if there are any views on last week’s Federal budget.
Mr Stevens speaks early tomorrow, about three hours before the minutes are released at 11.30 am
As well, the improvement in confidence in the RBA about the economic outlook, evident from the post rate meeting earlier this month, should be more apparent from the board minutes.
Some economists will be looking for clues that the RBA may have stopped cutting rates, and that the next move could be up sometime in the first half of 2010.
Certainly the RBA will wait and assess the impact of all of the monetary and fiscal easing that has already been pumped into the economy: the last two weeks of data flow for March and into April suggests the economy may not be as crippled as previously thought.
This week’s data flow includes confidence surveys for consumers, April car sales figures from the Australian Bureau of Statistics and Wage Price Indices for the March quarter and Average Weekly Earnings for the three weeks to February.
But the AMP’s Dr Shane Oliver is cautions saying that "While we expect the RBA to remain on hold in the short term its hard to see the RBA not cutting again if its and the Government’s forecasts for sub-par economic activity, rising unemployment and falling inflation over the next 18 months or so are correct.
"Australian data for consumer confidence will likely show a further rise following the relatively benign Budget and the better tone to recent economic news.
"And March quarter wages data is likely to show a further slowdown which will add to the case that inflation is not a concern."
Local results are due from grain groups GrainCorp (good) and AWB, (poor) with interims, brewer, Lion Nathan with its last result (good) and James Hardie’s annual (poor).
In the US, a survey of home builders and data for housing starts and new building permits will be looked at closely to see whether they confirm other indicators suggesting that the housing sector is bottoming.
Figures last week on foreclosures showed they are still running at record levels in most parts of the US, while prices again eased in the March quarter, according to figures from the US real estate agents trade group.
Sales of new homes were flat to disappointing, which could mean the surge in new mortgage finance that has been going on in the Us, has not hit this sector.
But some analysts point out the overwhelming bulk of new mortgages are for refinancing existing homes at lower interest rates, not buying new or existing homes.
After Friday’s worse than expected first quarter growth figures for Europe (down 2.5%) and Germany in particular( down 3.8%), analysts will be wondering about the release this week of May’s Euro-zone business conditions surveys.
These surveys have shown improving conditions, but production and growth figures have not followed up by reflecting these improvements.
Japanese GDP figures are out Wednesday and are likely to show the biggest slump ever recorded in the March quarter.
Again early figures suggest an improvement of sorts this quarter, but deflation is rampant, retail sales weak, unemployment rising and corporate profits weak, which do not make for a confident or upbeat outlook.
Besides the RBA releasing its minutes this week, the Bank of England and the US Federal Reserve will release the minutes from their last meetings and the Bank of Japan is expected to leave interest rates on hold at 0.1%, but may increase its quantitative easing program.
In the US, first-quarter earnings results are slowing and this week sees a scattering of figures.
Quarterly earnings from rival home improvement chains Home Depot Inc and Lowe’s will give us some clues as to the continuing strength of demand from the building and home renovation sectors.
Technology bellwether Hewlett-Packard Co also is scheduled to report results this week and could help or hinder the tech sector.
Tech stocks have been solid in the March upturn, but last week they seemed to develop some weakness as investors started taking profits.
Friday’s sell-off resulted in the Nasdaq breaking a 9-week winning streak; it lost around 3.4% over the five days of trading.
April housing starts are out tomorrow and will come a day before the release of the minutes of the Federal Reserve’s most recent policy meeting on April 28-29.
Thursday sees the latest weekly jobless claims and the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia’s May survey of business conditions in the US Mid-Atlantic region.
Thomson Reuters said that by Friday, 91% or 455 of the S&P 500 companies had reported first-quarter results, with 65% beating analysts’ estimates, 8% matching them and 26% missing them.
But for an interesting view on the accuracy of analysts, the Financial Times published a good look at them over the weekend.
Besides the manufacturing survey, European markets will also get the latest survey on German investor confidence and figures on UK economic growth.
Results are also expected from mobile phone giant, Vodafone, and international airlines, British Airways and Air France-KLM Group.
