Archive - Mar 5, 2015

According to Challenger, the February total planned job cut were over 50,000 for the second month in a row, or a total of 103,620 in the first two months of 2015, up 19% from the same period last year, with a 38% of the total, or 39,621 of these job cuts, due to plunging oil prices and about to take place in the highest paid oil extraction space.

As is normally the case, the ECB did not provide any details aside from its headline rates decision in the monetary policy decision press release, which as was expected by virtually everyone, were unchanged across the board.

• China Lowers Growth Target to About 7% (WSJ)
• Obesity Is Hurting the U.S. Economy in Surprising Ways (BBG)
• Embattled Hillary Clinton urges State Department to release emails (Reuters)
• Washington Strips New York Fed’s Power (WSJ)
• U.S. Supreme Court split over Obamacare challenge (Reuters)
• Citigroup Loses $800 Million as It Exits Turkey’s Akbank (BBG)
• Justice Who Once Tried to Kill Obamacare Now Potential Savior (BBG)
• Buyers of Espírito Santo Debt Face Financial Uncertainty (WSJ)

It has been a while since we have seen the USDJPY rampathon push US equities higher, so in a day dominated by central banks (first the BOE momentarily), and then the ECB's much anticipated announcement of the actual QE launch at the Draghi press conference at 1:30pm CET (taking place, ironically enough, in the place that was the blueprint for the Eurozone's capital controls, Cyprus), it only makes sense that after weeks of stage fright, the USDJPY algos reminded the world they are alive and well, and proceeded to ramp the key FX pair above 120, even though the currency that everyone will be talking about today is the Euro, hugging 1.10 as of this moment, but the real question is what happens after Draghi gives the asset buying green light: has all of Q€ been priced in already in FX, and will the EURUSD resume its surge higher, or is parity next stop?