Macro Afternoon
Its opposite day across Asia as Japanese stocks rebound while Chinese and satellite like the ASX200 pull back on the latest Chinese GDP print. Wall Street was closed last night saw the lack of a a solid lead is telling while in currency land, the USD is trying to stabilise after a round of weakness with the Australian dollar heading back below the 70 cent level. Meanwhile oil prices are holding on to their recent gains but not making further headway with Brent crude just below the $85USD per barrel level while gold is starting to retrace after going gangbusters through the $1900USD per ounce level last week, now at $1912 and looking ready to pull back to a more sustainable trendline:

Mainland Chinese share markets are retracing a little with the Shanghai Composite currently down 0.3% but still above the 3200 point level, currently at 3214 points while the Hang Seng Index is off a full 1%, currently at 21496 points. Japanese stock markets are coming back though as some stability courses throughout the local bond market and Yen gets a little weaker, with the Nikkei 225 closing 1.3% higher at 26152 points with the USDJPY pair slowly lifting off the floor to be just above the 128 handle but nowhere near out of the woods with resistance building as we head into the London open:

Australian stocks suffered a scratch session with no change as the ASX200 finished dead flat at 7386 points. The Australian dollar jumped a little higher on the Chinese GDP print and local consumer sentiment numbers but remains just below the 70 cent level after getting overextended late last week:

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