Currency Markets - Spanish Property

Currency markets - Spanish property

Summary: Summary of Overnight News: The FTSE- will open sharply higher this morning, pushed by a strong performance in New York last night. Elsewhere, IBM's second-quarter profit rose nearly percent, slightly exceeding analysts' forecasts despite another period of lacklustre revenue growth. Exec

currency markets

Article Body: Summary of Overnight News: The FTSE- will open sharply higher this morning, pushed by a strong performance in New York last night. Elsewhere, IBM's second-quarter profit rose nearly percent, slightly exceeding analysts' forecasts despite another period of lacklustre revenue growth. Executives acknowledged weakness in IBM's two biggest divisions, services and hardware. From April through June, IBM earned . bln Usd, . Usd per share, on revenue of . bln, the company said. In Asia, share prices rebounded in the morning session, after the Nikkei slumped over points yesterday, as bargain hunters stepped back into the market supported by Wall Street's overnight rise. However, while the broad picture was brighter, there was a reluctance to push the upside too aggressively ahead of US June CPI data, Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke's testimony to Congress starting later today, and a string of earnings reports from US high-tech firms such as Intel Corp, Apple Computer and Microsoft, due out this week. The Hang Seng ended the early session up . points at ,. while the Nikkei finished the morning better by . points at ,.. Meanwhile, oil prices rebounded this morning in Asia as continued concern about Iran's nuclear program and Israel's attacks on Lebanon kept the market volatile, dealers said. New York's main contract, light sweet crude for delivery in August, was at . Usd a barrel, up . Usd from . Usd in late US trading overnight. Brent North Sea crude for September delivery was up . Usd at . Usd.

USA

Figures out: : US CPI (Jun) %m/m Prev . : US CPIX (Jun) %m/m Prev . : US housing starts (Jun) k Prev : US building permits (Jun) k Prev : CA leading indicators (Jun) %m/m Prev . : US Bernanke Report on Economy & Fed Policy

A major London-based investment bank believes that, as was the case for June, the core CPI reading (:) will be the most important determinant of the FOMC's decision on August. Given their relatively benign forecast for the June core CPI, they look for the Fed to (finally) pause in August, though it is a close call. Clearly, a .% rise in the June core index would fundamentally alter the inflation picture and would, in their view, dictate another tightening next month. A more complete treatment of the monetary policy outlook is included in the discussion of Bernanke's Congressional testimony (:) where he will have a perfect opportunity to do two critical things: a) shape market expectations for the August meeting and b) explain the Fed's thinking and give markets, Congress, and the public a roadmap for how the FOMC might respond to various scenarios over the next six months.

UK

Figures out: : BoE MPC Minutes Exp - Prev - EURUSD @ . GBPUSD @ . GBPEUR @ . USDJPY @ .