Next Week At A Glance

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For a more comprehensive preview of next week's events, please refer to "The Monday Report", published each Monday morning. For all economic data release dates, ex-div dates and times and other relevant information, please refer to the FNArena Calendar.

By Greg Peel

The Australian result season shifts into second gear next week with highlights including releases from JB Hi Fi (JBH)), Ansell ((ANN)), Boral ((BLD)), CommBank ((CBA)), Leighton ((LEI)), OZ Minerals ((OZL)), WorleyParsons ((WOR)), Billabong ((BBG)), Downer EDI ((DOW)), Rio Tinto ((RIO)), Westfield ((WDC)) and Wesfarmers ((WES)), to name but a handful. ANZ Bank ((ANZ)) will also provide a quarterly update and David Jones ((DJS)) will release quarterly sales figures.

This week’s trickle of results has offered a mixed outlook at best, with some notable downside suffered from the likes of Cochlear ((COH)) and Macquarie Group ((MQG)). From next week we should start to see a little more colour, albeit in the meantime the index is still indicating a positive bias. Weak economic data this week (retail sales, jobs) have lowered the odds of a March rate cut and the stock market has used this development as a reason to buy, as if another 25 basis points is akin to QE3. All talk is of a pullback, but things rarely happen exactly when people expect they will.

Australian economic data releases next week include housing finance and investment lending and the NAB business and Westpac consumer confidence surveys.

The world’s greatest human annual migration is now underway as the Chinese head home for next week’s week-long New Year’s celebrations. The lengthy holiday shuts China down and affects a distortion in Chinese economic data around this time of year. Commodity markets also tend to go quiet.

Both Japan and the eurozone will release their initial December quarter GDP calculations next week and the Bank of Japan will hold a monetary policy meeting. Japan’s new, easy policy push is already a highlight of 2013.

The US will see a relatively quiet data week, albeit retail sales, industrial production and the Empire State manufacturing index will feature. The US quarterly result season is now all but wound down.
 

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