CORPORATE AND INSTITUTIONAL

The FOMC this morning announced as expected the formal start to winding down its balance sheet to commence next month.

NAB’s proprietary indicator of Australian retail sales, the NAB Cashless Retail Sales Index, reveals a sharp decline in spending in the month of August.

With technology developing at an unprecedented pace and customer expectations constantly evolving, business survival is dependent on understanding and adapting to this changing landscape.

US President Trump’s 40 minute address to the UN, in which he described N. Korea leader Kim Jong UN as “Rocket man on a suicide mission for himself and his regime” has given us a (predictable) song title but frankly not much else.

Aussie superfunds face a world where investment themes are changing and there’s a continued search for yield. NAB’s latest Superannuation FX Hedging survey indicates they’re up to the challenge.

NAB’s most recent FX Hedging survey shows that superfunds are adapting their hedging strategies, thanks in large part to an increase in size.

GBP and CAD pull back on latest BoC and BoE utterances, helping USD move ahead again aided too by modestly higher US Treasury yields (10s +2bps to 2.23%). This pulls AUD comfortably back below 0.80. It has already traded – intra-day – through last week’s 0.7956 low.

Why we forecast – it’s the turning point that matters

Another day on and the Pound has again been the star performer in the currency markets.

In Australia, the August NAB Monthly Business Survey showed some mixed results, but is still encouraging overall.

While the market’s focus was expected to be primarily on the US CPI print for August, there was much more market action across the Atlantic with the Pound soaring on the back of a near term rate rise warning from the Bank of England.

Global growth lifts in mid-2017, heading back towards trend rate as pace of advanced economy output expansion picks up.