Asian stocks fell, led by Japanese shares, after Friday's US non-farm payrolls missed. The MSCI Asia Pacific was 0.5% lower with the Nikkei down 0.9%, although the Hang Seng rose slightly and the Kospi was down 0.3%. The NZ dollar weakened after some milk powder exports were banned in China, and the Australian dollar reached a 3-year low. (Bloomberg)
Today: UK and Eurozone services PMI; US non-manufacturing composite ISM; Fed's Fisher speaks. HSBC, Standard Chartered, Prudential.
Lloyds CEO talks of dividend bonanza: António Horta-Osório, "aims to start paying out up to 70 per cent of the bank's earnings in dividends within three years as he seeks to attract investors ahead of the sale of the government's stake". The relatively high dividend target was discussed during a recent round of investor roadshows in the UK and overseas, according to people involved in the meetings. (Financial Times)
China's services sector maintained modest expansion in July, according to the HSBC/Markit PMI survey. The index stood at 51.3 in July, unchanged from June and slightly above a 20-month low of 51.1 struck in April. (Reuters)
TCI demands EADS sell Dassault stake: The activist hedge fund, has written to EADS' CEO to demand it sell one of its most sensitive assets in a direct challenge to the defence company's management and the French government. (Financial Times)
Former First Direct CEO to lead £1bn RBS branches bid: Alan Hughes will lead a consortium comprising private equity groups Blackstone and Anacap, which is preparing to table an offer this week for about 315 branches being sold by RBS. Two other bids are expected ahead of an unofficial deadline of the middle of this week: one from a group led by Corsair, the US private equity company that also has the backing of a Church of England fund, and another from a group of 20 UK asset managers, including Schroders and Threadneedle, fronted by former Tesco finance director Andrew Higginson. (Financial Times)
BG says US shale gas boom won't be replicated elsewhere in short term: "Our view is that we're sceptical that's going to be fully replicated anywhere else as quickly as we've seen it in the US." (Financial Times)
China banned New Zealand milk powder imports after a botulism scare, the NZ trade minister Tim Groser said on Sunday. Shares in Auckland-based Fonterra, the world's biggest dairy exporter, fell as much as 8.7% today. Fonterra said on Saturday that it found in some of its products bacteria that can cause botulism. (Reuters)(FastFT)
"Gold miners have started to protect themselves against more falls in the price of the precious metal, in a tentative return to the long-shunned practice of hedging." Many large gold miners abandoned hedging in the past decade as prices rallied. (Financial Times)
"Investors poured a record $40.3bn into U. equity mutual funds and exchange-trade funds in July, after largely ignoring equities in June, research provider TrimTabs Investment Research said on Sunday." (Reuters)
Hedge funds lowered bullish gold bets for the first time in five weeks by July 30, CFTC data shows. (Bloomberg)
COMMENT AND CURIOS:
- The end of Wall St's commodities love affair. (Financial Times)
- Living wills guidance is taking shape. (Financial Times)
- Analysis: Is there a Libor problem in oil market pricing? (Financial Times)
- Yuan liberalisation: turf war between SAFE and PBoC catches multinationals in crossfire. (Reuters)
- Investors warming to European stocks. (Wall Street Journal)
- 14% returns as easy as reading macro data. (FTfm)
- Hedge funds transform into 'family offices' to avoid regulations. (FTfm)
OVERNIGHT MARKETS: DOWN
Asian markets
Nikkei 225 down -127.98 (-0.88%) at 14,338
Topix down -7.08 (-0.59%) at 1,189
Hang Seng up +35.99 (+0.16%) at 22,227
US markets
S&P 500 up +2.80 (+0.16%) at 1,710
DJIA up +30.34 (+0.19%) at 15,658
Nasdaq up +13.85 (+0.38%) at 3,690
European markets
Eurofirst 300 up +3.57 (+0.29%) at 1,225
FTSE100 down -34.11 (-0.51%) at 6,648
CAC 40 up +2.92 (+0.07%) at 4,046
Dax down -3.79 (-0.05%) at 8,407
Currencies
€/$ 1.33 (1.33)
$/¥ 98.77 (98.89)
£/$ 1.53 (1.53)
Commodities ($)
Brent Crude (ICE) up +0.32 at 109.27
Light Crude (Nymex) up +0.22 at 107.16
100 Oz Gold (Comex) up +6.70 at 1,317
Copper (Comex) unchanged 0.00 at 3.17
10-year government bond yields (%)
US 2.62%
UK 2.42%
Germany 1.65%
CDS (closing levels)
Markit iTraxx SovX Western Europe -1.21bps at 89.33bp
Markit iTraxx Europe -0.6bps at 96.02bp
Markit iTraxx Xover -0.57bps at 397.44bp
Sources: FT, Bloomberg, Markit
