Global
U.S PPI
On Tuesday, February 15, the U.S. Department of Labor released data showing that the U.S. PPI increased 9.7% year-over-year in January, exceeding market expectations of 9.1% and missing the previous month’s adjusted value of 9.8%. U.S. January core PPI rose 8.3% year-on-year, also higher than market expectations of 7.9%, compared with the previous value of 8.3%.
On a year-over-year basis, the U.S. PPI rose 1% in January, twice the expected value of 0.5%, compared with 0.4% in the previous month. The U.S. core PPI rose 0.8% in January, compared with 0.5% expected and 0.6% adjusted last month.
This is the 21st consecutive month of PPI increases, with the cost of goods increasing faster than the service sector, and energy and food prices remaining the biggest drivers.
FED vote delayed
Originally scheduled for Tuesday, February 15 EST, the Senate Banking Committee voted on the nomination of Powell and four other Federal Reserve candidates, due to Republican senators boycotting Raskin’s nomination for Vice Chairman of Federal Reserve Supervision and absent from the vote, resulting in the lack of a quorum necessary to conduct a formal vote, including Fed Chairman Powell’s re-election nomination vote was delayed.
U.S debt holding
U.S. government securities held outside of the United States reached a record $7.74 trillion in December 2021, according to the International Capital Flows (TIC) report released by the U.S. Treasury Department on Tuesday, Feb. 15, EST.
Among them, the total amount of U.S. Treasuries held overseas increased by $5.8 billion in December compared to the ringgit in November.
It is worth noting that the two major overseas “debtors” of U.S. debt — China and Japan ended the previous two consecutive months to collectively increase their holdings of U.S. debt, China and Japan have reduced their holdings of U.S. debt in December.
Japan’s holdings of U.S. Treasuries fell $23 billion in December to $1.3 trillion.
China’s holdings of U.S. debt fell by $12.2 billion to $1.07 trillion in December.
The U.K., the third largest overseas holder of U.S. debt, increased its holdings by $25.4 billion in December to $647.4 billion.
Australia
ASX up
The S&P/ASX200 is up today, gaining 37.80 points or 0.52% to 7,244.70. The top performing stocks in this index are LIONTOWN RESOURCES LIMITED and IMUGENE LIMITED, up 14.39% and 10.91% respectively.
