Good morning, New York...
Daylight Savings Time started on Sunday, moving clocks forward an hour. British Summer Time doesn't begin until March 31st, so enjoy easier to schedule transatlantic conference calls while it lasts.
FT ALPHAVILLE
China's sluggish, narrow-based recovery. A big stack of official Chinese economic data was released over the weekend and it paints a somewhat mixed picture of the country in 2013, writes Kate. The short version is that some growth indicators were significantly weaker than expected, but others beat consensus forecasts — and consumer inflation appears to be on the rise again, even when the new year effect is discounted. This comes after strong export growth and weak import data surprised everyone late last week.
Xstrata 2.0 (or what Mick did next).Bloomberg quotes people familiar with the matter that "Xstrata (XTA) Plc Chief Executive Officer Mick Davis and Chief Financial Officer Trevor Reid are weighing plans to set up a privately backed mining fund after Glencore International Plc (GLEN) takes over their company..." Unsurprisingly the story drew a testy "no comment" from Xstrata, Neil outlines a couple of reasons why.
NEWS
Private equity firms are highlighting the record levels of cash they have returned to their investors even though the value of their portfolios has risen faster, swollen by trillions of assets that they are struggling to sell. Fund managers distributed $318bn to their limited partners as of June last year, and $330bn in 2011, through dividends and asset disposals, according to data compiled by pension fund adviser Hamilton Lane. This exceeded distributions in 2007 – $305bn – the peak of the leveraged buyout boom. (Financial Times)
Europe's repo market contracted last year, suggesting that risk-averse banks are relying on the cheap loans supplied by the region's central banks rather than lending to each other. The total value of outstanding European repurchase, or repo contracts – whereby banks pledge securities as collateral in return for funding from money market managers and other investors – stood at €5.6tn in December, down from a high of €6.2tn a year earlier. (Financial Times)
Intrade has halted all trading activity and frozen customer accounts pending an investigation into its business. The popular Dublin-based online prediction market said in a notice on its website late on Sunday that recently discovered "circumstances", on which it did not elaborate, would be subject to an investigation and could uncover potential "financial irregularities". (Financial Times)
Kuroda will consider buying derivatives: "We will carefully consider such a proposal," BoJ nominee Haruhiko Kuroda said in response to a lawmaker's question in his second parliamentary confirmation hearing today. However he noted opinions vary on buying assets such as swaps, and said bond buying would continue to be the key tool. (Bloomberg)
US authorities examining high-frequency trading are facing an uphill battle to combat potential market manipulation, from incomplete records to interpreting volumes of trades executed in milliseconds. The FBI joined up with the Securities and Exchange Commission recently to focus on high-speed, algorithmic trading. The SEC has been investigating possible manipulative trading strategies since the 2010 "flash crash" and hashired more than a dozen quantitative analysts across three of its divisions. (Financial Times)
The City of London's jobs decline is showing signs of easing, a Square Mile recruitment company has reported. Morgan McKinley said the number of new vacancies rose 11 per cent last month compared with January. The total of 2,583 was still 15 per cent down on a year ago but the decrease was smaller than in previous months. (Financial Times)
Markets: Global stocks are mixed with investor optimism alternately boosted by a surprisingly strong US jobs report but restrained by weaker than expected Chinese economic data. Still, the cautious start to the week leaves many leading stock barometers at or near record highs as hopes for worldwide growth prospects and ongoing central bank support provide underlying demand for "risk" assets. (FT's Global Market Overview)
