市场消息

Bloomberg.com — Filings for U.S. unemployment benefits unexpectedly rose to a seven-week high while remaining consistent with a tight job market, Labor Department figures showed Thursday.

Unemployment-benefits applications below 300,000 are generally considered consistent with a healthy labor market, and the latest tally still isn’t far from the 48-year low of 209,000 reached in April. The claims figures, which tend to be subject to swings, have been on a declining trend as a widespread shortage of qualified workers spurs employers to retain staff while offering more perks to attract new ones.

The May jobs report due next week is projected to show payrolls expanded by close to 200,000 while the unemployment rate held at April’s 3.9 percent level, which was the lowest since December 2000.

Bloomberg.com — U.K. retail sales rebounded more than expected in April as the spring weather lured shoppers into stores.

Sales climbed 1.6 percent from March, compared with a median estimate of a 0.9 percent gain in a Bloomberg survey. The surge was led by fuel, household goods and clothing, according to data from the Office for National Statistics in London.

After cold weather hit sales at the start of the year, the Bank of England is looking out for a recovery in consumption as it debates when to next raise interest rates. Britons are just now emerging from a year of shrinking real incomes after the vote to leave the European Union battered the pound and stoked inflation.

The pound climbed after the report, rising 0.5 percent to $1.3409 as of 9:36 a.m. in London.

Some stores reported that the weather had made a difference in April in getting people back into the shops, the ONS said. Clothing retailer Next Plc said this month that sales surged amid warm weather and it raised its full-year profit forecast.

Longer Term
Despite the bounceback in April, the longer-term trend is more subdued. Over three months, sales gained 0.1 percent from the previous period, the ONS said. Combined sales in April and March increased 1.3 percent from a year earlier, compared with a 2.9 percent pickup a year ago.

“Over the longer-term, retail sales growth has slowed considerably, with increases in food, household goods and internet retailers being largely offset by declines across all other types of retailing,” said Rob Kent-Smith, head of national accounts at the ONS.

That trend has hurt Marks & Spencer Group Plc, the 134-year-old retail chain that’s a fixture of shopping districts, which is shutting a third of its large stores. Halfords Group Plc, the car-parts and bicycling retailer, said this week that profit probably won’t grow this year.

From a year ago, retail sales increased 1.4 percent in April. Excluding fuel, annual growth was 1.5 percent.

The BOE expects household spending to pick up, but not enough to prevent economic growth from slowing markedly in 2018. Economists and investors nevertheless see about a 50 percent chance of an interest-rate hike this year after the first increase in a decade last November.

Bloomberg.com — Deutsche Bank AG will cut equities jobs by a quarter and reduce overall positions by at least 7,000 as chief executive officer Christian Sewing seeks to slash costs and boost profitability at the investment bank.

The reductions will take the number of jobs at the Frankfurt-based lender to well below 90,000 and lead to a restructuring charge of as much as 800 million euros ($935 million) this year, it said in a statement on Thursday. The bank also plans to reduce funds at risk and seek to further drive down expenses.

Sewing is accelerating a push to refocus the lender on its European home market and reverse a two-decade effort to compete head-to-head with the large Wall Street firms that dominate volatile securities trading. The future of the investment bank and failure of predecessor John Cryan to cut costs and restructure fast enough had been key factors in last month’s management shakeup. Global equities has been one of the new CEO’s first targets.

“The equities business is a very sensible area to focus the cuts on seeing as they haven’t been achieving the return on capital they want there,” Neil Smith, an analyst at Bankhaus Lampe who has a buy recommendation on Deutsche Bank shares, said by phone from Dusseldorf. “The key issue for Sewing to focus on immediately is cost, where Deutsche Bank disappointed last year.

The bank, which is holding its annual general meeting in Frankfurt on Thursday, is considering 10,000 job cuts, people with knowledge of the matter said on Wednesday.

Precise Forecast

The new target for job cuts is the first precise forecast given by Sewing. Cryan in late 2015 foresaw 9,000 job cuts by 2020. Group headcount actually fell by about 1,500 during Cryan’s tenure. The bank also on Thursday said it will reduce its leverage exposure in the corporate and investment bank by more than 100 billion euros as part of the overhaul and is targeting about a 10 percent post-tax return on tangible equity from 2021 onwards.

There has been increasing evidence in recent weeks that the pace of job cuts is picking up, with the investment bank bearing the brunt. Deutsche Bank has said it will move to smaller premises in New York and will close its Houston office entirely due to a withdrawal from advisory services for the oil and gas sector.

Chief Financial Officer James von Moltke hinted last month that the new CEO’s cost-cutting measures to a large extent are a continuation of plans already being developed under Cryan. The bank foresees adjusted costs not exceeding 23 billion euros this year, with that figure falling to 22 billion euros in 2019.

Bloomberg.com — A drop in Japanese shares dominated an otherwise mixed session for Asian equities, as the yen extended gains amid more twists and turns on trade and lingering emerging-market risks. The dollar steadied and 10-year Treasury yields pared a decline below 3 percent.

Automakers were the biggest drag on the Topix index, as the yen surged after President Donald Trump ordered consideration of a probe into automobile imports. Shares fell in China and South Korea, and were little changed in Australia and Hong Kong. All major U.S. equity benchmarks rose Wednesday after minutes from the most recent Federal Reserve meeting showed American central bankers in no hurry to accelerate the pace of rate hikes even as the economy continues to improve. Oil slipped.

Traders are trying to navigate escalating geopolitical and trade risks, from Trump’s decision to back away from a recently announced trade agreement with China to uncertainty about whether a planned summit meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un will go ahead. Meanwhile, questions are swirling around the Italian populist government’s economic policies and shaky emerging markets after Turkey raised rates to halt a slide in the lira.

Elsewhere, most Asian emerging-market currencies were little changed, while many bonds advanced. The euro steadied after falling to a six-month low.

Bloomberg.com — Federal Reserve officials signaled they are set to raise interest rates at their meeting in June, but sent no clear message on whether they’d hike one or two more times this year following that move.

U.S. central bankers said “it would likely soon be appropriate” to increase the benchmark policy rate, according to a record of their May 1-2 meeting released Wednesday, confirming investor expectations for a move next month. Beyond that, officials “expressed a range of views on the amount of further policy firming that would likely be required.”

“It seems like they couldn’t agree on anything beyond the next meeting,” said Stephen Stanley, chief economist at Amherst Pierpont Securities LLC in New York. “They’re really, truly going to be taking this one meeting at a time.”

Inflation rose at the committee’s targeted pace of a 2 percent annual rate in March, yet officials were cautious on whether that was sustainable given that prices had been mostly below that goal for the past six years.

“It was noted that it was premature to conclude that inflation would remain at levels around 2 percent, especially after several years in which inflation had persistently run below the committee’s 2 percent objective,” the minutes said.

The commentary was somewhat unusual given the data in hand: unemployment at the lowest level in 17 years, wages gradually moving higher and the economic expansion apparently on a firm footing.

“There was very little concern about overheating and inflation overshooting too much,” said Julia Coronado, president of Macropolicy Perspectives LLC in New York. “There was more concern that the recent progress cannot be sustained.”

March forecasts by the Federal Open Market Committee showed the committee split between three and four hikes this year, excluding three outliers. That outlook will be updated at the FOMC’s June 12-13 meeting, after which Chairman Jerome Powell holds a press conference.

As noted in their May 2 statement, which inserted a second reference to their “symmetric” inflation target, the committee said it wouldn’t be concerned if inflation overshot the target.

A temporary period of inflation “modestly above 2 percent would be consistent with the committee’s symmetric inflation objective and could be helpful in anchoring longer-run inflation expectations,” the minutes said.

“They could have sounded a lot more optimistic about the economy, and confirmed expectations for four increases this year, but they didn’t do that,” said Michael Hanson, chief U.S. macro strategist at TD Securities in New York. “This is a committee that feels like it has been head-faked one too many times on inflation.”

Since the May meeting, the dollar has continued to strengthen, oil prices are higher, and 30-year mortgage rates have also moved up. Tightening U.S. financial conditions have been felt sharply in some emerging markets, with Argentine and Turkish currencies retreating sharply.

Fed officials have little foresight into what exiting from post-crisis, ultra-easy monetary policy will mean for the U.S. economy — let alone the rest of the world — and that may be one reason why they are reluctant to look beyond the next meeting.

“The closer you get to a normal monetary policy, the less agreement you’re going to have about continuing to slog along,” Stanley said. “I’m a little bit surprised that that discussion seems to be drawing so much disagreement already.”

Investing.com – In April of this year consumer prices in the UK increased by 0.4% compared to the previous month and by 2.4% compared to April last year, according to the National Statistic Office (ONS) of the country.

Analysts on average expected the rise of the first indicator by 0.5%, the second – by 2.5%, according to Trading Economics.

In March, the rise in prices was 0.1% and 2.5%, respectively.

The growth of consumer prices remains above the target level of the Bank of England at 2% for fifteen months in a row. The annual increase in April was minimal for the last 13 months. One of the factors was the decrease in the cost of air tickets, since this year Easter fell in March, and in 2017 – in April.

The CPI Core index, which does not include food, alcohol, tobacco and energy prices, was 2.1% last month, compared to 2.3% in March. Experts expected a slowdown in growth to 2.2%.

Prices for food and non-alcoholic beverages in April decreased by 0.2% in monthly terms. Clothing and footwear went up by 0.4%, alcohol and tobacco products – by 0.8%, transport services – by 1%.

At the same time, the cost of soft drinks jumped by 2.8% compared to March, which was a record increase during the settlement. This was due to the introduction of a tax on high sugar content in soda.

Retail prices (index RPI) rose last month by 3.4% compared with April 2017 and by 0.5% compared to March of this year. It is the RPI index used by British employers in negotiating wages. The difference in the dynamics of the CPI and RPI indices is due to the inclusion of housing costs in the RPI, as well as different weights of air fares, insurance and gasoline prices.

Also, ONS reported on Wednesday that the growth in house prices in the UK in March remained at around 4.2% in annual terms. Data for February were revised to 4.2% from the previously announced at 4.4%.

Investing.com – According to the data published on Wednesday, the growth in production in Germany’s private sector slowed to the lowest level in a year and a half in May.

An important report intensified fears about the situation in the largest economy of the eurozone, and also worsened the forecasts regarding the possibility of tightening monetary policy from the European Central Bank.

Composite index of business activity (PMI) from Markit in Germany, which measures the results of activity in the manufacturing and service sectors, in May fell to 53.1 – the minimum value for 20 months. In April, the value of this index was 54.6.

Economists predicted that the value of this index would be 54.7.

The preliminary value of the index of business activity in the service sector (PMI) of Germany this month fell to 52.1 after a value of 53.0 in April.

Analysts predicted that in May the value of this index will be 53.1.

The index of business activity in the manufacturing sector (PMI) of Germany this month fell to 56.8 against the revised value of 58.1 for April.

Analysts had expected in February the reduction of this figure to 57.9.

If the value of the PMI index is greater than 50.0, it means economic growth, if lower – a decline.

Commenting on the report, leading economist Markit Phil Smith said: “The weak growth in the number of new orders and the further decline in business confidence indicate a significant slowdown in economic growth compared with the end of 2017”.

WASHINGTON, May 23 (Reuters) – the US President Donald Trump said on Tuesday that there is “substantial probability” that his meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong-no will not take place on June 12, as planned, amid fears that the DPRK leader is not wants to abandon nuclear weapons.

Trump voiced doubts as to whether negotiations with Kim would take place, at a meeting with South Korean President Mun Zhe In who was on a visit to Washington to urge the American leader not to miss the rare opportunity to establish relations with the DPRK.

“There is a very significant probability … that nothing will work out, it’s okay,” Trump told reporters.

“This does not mean that we will not succeed with time, but June 12 may not work out, but there is a big chance that we will hold a meeting.”

US Secretary Mike Pompeo told reporters that the administration of Trump continues to prepare for the summit on June 12, but refused to say whether it will take place for sure.

Pyongyang last week threatened to cancel the summit, if Washington insists on unilateral destruction of nuclear weapons, and condemned the joint military exercises of the United States and South Korea.

Moon told Trump in a personal conversation that there is no doubt about the intention of the DPRK to participate in the negotiations, a representative of the South Korean government told reporters.

White House spokeswoman Sarah Sanders said that preparations for the summit are actively moving forward after constructive negotiations with South Korea, according to US officials.

Mun’s national security advisor Chon Yi Yon told reporters that, in his opinion, there is a “99.9 percent probability” that the meeting between Trump and Kim will be held as planned.

Trump repeated that Kim’s security during the talks would be guaranteed, and the DPRK would be enriched if he agreed to denuclearization, adding that he wanted to conclude a deal on the destruction of Pyongyang’s nuclear weapons within a “short time”.

NEW YORK, May 23 (Reuters) – US stocks ended Tuesday’s trading in negative territory amid uncertainty over the outcome of Washington’s and Beijing’s trade talks and a decline in the energy and industrial sectors.

US President Donald Trump on Tuesday said he was dissatisfied with the last stage of negotiations with China. Trump also reported a “significant probability” that his meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong-Ho will not take place on June 12, as planned.

The industrial sector slowed down by 1.3 percent, a day after a record about almost two months of recovery, triggered by optimism over the pause in the trade dispute between the US and China. Energy shares also fell by 1.3 percent.

Shares of Tesla Inc fell by 3.3 percent, reaching a low at the close since early April, after the Consumer Reports reported problems in the brake system of the new electric vehicle of Model 3.

The Dow Jones index fell by 0.72 percent to 24,834.41 points, the S & P 500 index – by 0.31 percent to 2.724.44 points, the Nasdaq Composite index – by 0.21 percent to 7.378.46 points.

Shares of Micron Technology Inc. (NASDAQ: MU) rose by 6.4 percent after the memory chip maker announced a $ 10 billion buyback program.

Kohl’s shares fell by 7.4 percent after the retailer predicted a slowdown in sales growth in the second half of the year.