Weekly rebound in reach, China data deluge looms

Asian stocks are poised to end the week on a strong footing on Friday, spurred on by another solid rise on Wall Street the day before that puts some key benchmark indexes across the continent on track to register modest weekly gains.

The European Central Bank cut interest rates on Thursday and the Fed is set to begin a pretty substantial easing cycle next week. Although the former was no surprise and traders have been expecting the latter for a while, they are conducive to a ‘risk on’ environment that should boost sentiment in Asia on Friday.

The S&P 500 and Nasdaq both rose for a fourth consecutive day on Thursday. The S&P 500 came within 1% of its record high struck on July 15 and the Nasdaq, up 5.3% so far this week, is on track for its biggest weekly rise this year.

In other good news, Japan’s Nikkei on Thursday snapped a seven-day losing streak in style, jumping 3.4%. Notably, it did so without the help of a weaker yen – the yen made a new high for the year against the dollar and although it recoiled, it still ended Thursday slightly stronger.

But if yen strength is to persist, the outlook for Japanese stocks is murky. Indeed, the outlook for global asset prices may also be murky if the yen carry trade unwind has further to run, as SocGen strategists expect.

This creates “clear market risks as market leverage in this cycle comes mainly from the Japanese currency,” they said on Thursday, adding that they are increasing their yen exposure and reducing their Japanese equities exposure.

If markets across Asia are set to end the week on a high, the exception once again could be China. Shanghai stocks on Thursday posted their lowest close since January 2019.

Shanghai’s blue chip index will likely end the week in the red, its fourth weekly fall in a row and the 14th decline out of the last 17 weeks. It’s been a miserable run that has seen the index lose 15%, but surely it has to turn at some point. Right?

A batch of top-tier economic data from China over the weekend could be the trigger although that may require some rare upside surprises.

Beijing releases house price, investment, industrial production and retail sales figures for August on Saturday, and economists polled by Reuters generally expect the numbers to come in weaker than July’s readings.

The calendar in Asia on Friday, meanwhile, sees the release of Indian wholesale price inflation, a speech by Bank of Thailand governor Sethaput Suthiwartnarueput and Bank of Japan board member Naoki Tamura.

Here are key developments that could provide more direction to Asian markets on Friday:

– India WPI inflation (August)

– South Korea import & export prices (August)

– New Zealand manufacturing PMI (August)

(Reporting by Jamie McGeever; Editing by Deepa Babington)