French business confidence to improve in July

Jul 22, 2015 05:48 am UTC| Commentary

The French National Statistical Institute (INSEE) business confidence index for the entire economy is expected to improve from 97 to 98 in July (historical average=100). The INSEE business survey is a reliable tool that...

China central bank has room for significant easing

Jul 22, 2015 05:42 am UTC| Commentary Central Banks

With China enjoying a current account surplus of 2% of GDP, inflation under control, with the latest reading is 1.4% yoy versus 6.45% in June 2011, and the deepest currency reserves in the world, the China Central Bank has...

BRL needs to depreciate more to make Brazilian exports competitive

Jul 22, 2015 05:34 am UTC| Commentary

While the recent BRL depreciation is significant, it is not yet sufficient to make Brazilian exports (manufacturing in particular) competitive in a world where trade growth has declined considerably.Given the rigidities in...

Japan might take some time in to reach trade balance on a sustainable basis

Jul 22, 2015 05:31 am UTC| Commentary

As oil prices have fallen rapidly, the terms of trade are improving, leading to a shrinking trade deficit as a trend.As exports were weak last year, export growth this year will be prominent due to the base effect....

Greece to repay ECB loan

Jul 22, 2015 05:28 am UTC| Commentary

ECB agreed to give 7bn loan to Greece last week, and the country should be able to pay the ECB 3.5bn debt redemption due on Monday. On top of that, the Greek government should settle the IMF missed payments (1.54bn in June...

MERS concerns likely to cause a dip in South Korea's GDP growth

Jul 22, 2015 05:23 am UTC| Commentary

BoK Governor Lee Ju-yeol already disclosed a flash estimate of 0.4% qoq, at the press conference following the MPC meeting on 9 July, thus the release of advance South Korean GDP figures for Q2 2015 is basically set to be...

Mexican retail sales trending up, but likely slowed sequentially in Q2

Jul 22, 2015 05:17 am UTC| Commentary

Mexican retail sales growth until April this year has trended up mostly on base effects. With the forecast of 5.0% yoy growth in May, average retail sales growth this year stands at 5.1% yoy.The strong base effect from Q1...