Boost to eurozone consumer confidence expected in week’s data
Tuesday will be the only important day in terms of data releases in most markets thanks to a shortened week for the public holidays surrounding Christmas, although some interesting Japanese data will be published on Christmas Day itself.
Monday’s highlight will be the release of consumer confidence figures for the eurozone in December. The previous month saw confidence fall from -11.1 to -11.6 on the index but the expectation is that falling oil prices and increasing real incomes should boost consumer confidence. The consensus prediction is that the index will show -11.0 in December.
The third release of estimates of US gross domestic product for the third quarter will be released on Tuesday. Analysts suggest that consumer spending was much stronger in the third quarter than previously though and so the consensus is that the annualised rate of growth will be revised upwards from 3.9 per cent in the second estimate to 4.3 per cent.
US durable goods orders and personal income and spending data will be published on Tuesday as well. Both are expected to show an acceleration in November, for durable goods this is thought to be mainly due to an increase in aircraft sales. The year’s last University of Michigan confidence index is expected to show a final reading of 93.3, revised downward slightly from 93.8 in the initial release.
Tuesday will also see the release of the final estimate of UK GDP in the third quarter, but this is expected to remain unchanged at 0.7 per cent quarter-on-quarter growth.
Thursday, a public holiday in the US and UK for Christmas, will see the release of Japanese inflation and labour market data for November as well as retail sales and industrial production figures.
On Friday, Haruhiko Kuroda, the governor of the Bank of Japan, said that the country was on track to defeat inflation after the bank expanded its quantitative easing scheme in October with an aim to expand the monetary base by an annual Y80tn.
Thursday’s estimates of inflation are, however, expected to show falling inflation again. Stripping out the effects of the April VAT rise, inflation was 0.9 per cent in October and this is expected to fall to 0.7 per cent in November on the back of falling energy prices.
Industrial production figures ought to be more encouraging: Growth is expected to accelerate to 0.9 per cent in November up from 0.4 per cent in October.