Local Markets Commentary

The Australian market opensend-of-month trade ahead of influential domestic and regional data, followingpre-trade announcements from several major financial stocks. Regionally, Chinareleases its official (National Bureau of Statistics-calculated) Octobermanufacturing and services sector PMIs midday AEDT. The Bank of Japan is due toannounce outcomes from today’s policy meeting 2pm AEDT. Locally today,September quarter CPI growth and financial aggregates, including private sectorcredit, are due 11.30am AEDT. In addition, ANZ has reported full year resultspre trade. Being the last day of October, a raft of September quarter reportsis also anticipated. In overnight commodities trade, oil picked up the pace ofthe previous session’s falls. US (December) gold futures continued lower. Ironore (China port, 62% Fe) rose modestly. LME copper fell. Nickel turned slightlyhigher. Aluminium extended this week’s decline. The $A surpassed US71.00c afterappreciating to US70.95c early yesterday evening.

Choppy trade featured acrossmajor European and US equities markets overnight amid a raft of high profilecorporate earnings reports and influential euro zone data. Notably, key USindices opened higher and in the last two hours of trade were propelled tosession peaks. Despite marked vacillations, the FTSE 100 settled near sessionhighs also, supported by the previous night’s budget announcement and strong BPearnings. In the euro zone, the first estimate for September quarter GDP growthcame in at 1.7% year-on-year, following 2.1% for the June quarter, and against expectationsof at least 1.8%. For the three months, GDP grew 0.2%, against 0.4% during theJune quarter Business and economic sentiment indices also pulled back. Aninitial October CPI growth reading for Germany was estimated at 2.5% following2.4% for September. Among US data releases, Case-Shiller reported 5.5% higherhouse prices for August against 5.9% in July, representing a fifth consecutivemonthly slowing. A Conference Board October consumer sentiment reading rose 2.6to an 18-year peak of 137.9. Tonight in the US, treasury funding requirements,a private sector jobs report, employment costs, a Chicago PMI update and weeklymortgage applications are due. Companies scheduled to reveal earnings orprovide updates later today or tonight include: Audi, Banco Santander, CreditSuisse, General Motors, GlaxoSmithKline, Jaguar Land Rover, Kellogg, MazdaMotor, Nomura Holdings, Samsung, Sanofi, Takeda Pharmaceutical, Telefonica,Tesla, Yamaha Motor and Yum! Brands. In overnight corporate news, Facebook hasrevealed weaker-than-anticipated revenue and user growth in post-US trade. Thiswill impact some trade sentiment tonight. Nvidia benefited from an investmenthouse upgrade, helping boost chip manufacturers. Apple unveiled a new MacBookAir and new Mac Mini. Further oil price falls supported US transport stocks.