CURRENCY MARKET WRAP
As of Wed Nov 20th, Singapore Time zone UTC+8
U.S. Dollar Index, +0.03%, 97.82
USDJPY, -0.18%, $108.47
EURUSD, +0.05%, $1.1078
GBPUSD, -0.20%, $1.2929
USDCAD, +0.49%, $1.3271
AUDUSD, +0.18%, $0.6823
NZDUSD, +0.54%, $0.6432
U.S. Total housing starts increased 3.8% m/m to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1.314 million (consensus 1.300 million) while total building permits increased 5.0% m/m to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1.461 million (consensus 1.365 million).
The U.S. Treasury market was relatively quiet, but demand for longer-dated bonds contributed to some curve-flattening activity. The 2-yr yield was unchanged at 1.59%, and the 10-yr yield declined two basis points to 1.79%. The U.S. Dollar Index increased 0.03% to 97.82.
Release of the RBA minutes caused an initial dip in Aussie with monetary authorities agreeing that a ‘case could be made’ for a rate cut at the November meeting. However, the RBA is also clearly concerned with the limits of lower bound and some analysts do not think the central bank will ease until February, preferring to keep its policy options flexible to maintain maximum impact.
STOCK MARKET WRAP
S&P500, -0.06%, 3,120.18
Nasdaq, +0.24%, 8,570.66
Nikkei Futures, -0.97%, 23,173.0
S&P 500 declined 0.06% on Tuesday in a mixed session. The retail industry was under pressure following disappointing quarterly results and guidance from Home Depot (HD 225.86, -12.99, -5.4%) and Kohl’s (KSS 47.02, -11.38, -19.5%).
Gains were mainly found in the heavily-weighted S&P 500 health care (+0.7%), information technology (+0.2%), and financials (+0.2%) sectors. The real estate sector (+0.2%) also finished in positive territory.
TJX Companies (TJX 60.64, +1.09, +1.8%) was a bright spot among the retailers after it beat top and bottom-line estimates and raised its full-year guidance. TJX likely tempered some concerns about U.S. consumer spending for the holiday shopping season that may have been engendered by Home Depot and Kohl’s.
Separately, shares of AT&T (T 38.00, -1.63, -4.1%) pulled back 4% after the stock was downgraded to Sell from Neutral at MoffettNathanson. Shares of Slack (WORK 21.18, -1.93, -8.4%) sold off on news that Microsoft’s (MSFT 150.39, +0.05, unch) competitive product, Teams, increased daily active users by nearly 50% since July.