Next Week At A Glance

This story features BHP GROUP LIMITED, and other companies. For more info SHARE ANALYSIS: BHP

For a more comprehensive preview of next week's events, please refer to "The Monday Report", published each Monday morning. For all economic data release dates, ex-div dates and times and other relevant information, please refer to the FNArena Calendar.

By Greg Peel

The first round of the French general election to be held on Sunday is offering up a deal of uncertainty for markets, prompting a rush of hedging activities in currencies in particular. Uncertainty is being driven by the fact the polls are inconclusive, notwithstanding no one feels safe in believing the polls anymore, post Brexit and Trump.

Trading on Monday, therefore could be volatile, or not. In Australia, Anzac Day closes the market on Tuesday (ditto for New Zealand) which likely means many in the market may elect to take a four-day break again, especially given school holidays. Trading could be thin.

As the earnings season continues to play out in the US – so far not bad, despite a couple of big name misses – Wall Street will also be looking ahead to Friday’s first estimate of March quarter GDP. Expectations have soured somewhat lately following earlier exuberant predictions.

Ahead of that release, the US will see new and pending home sales, house prices, consumer confidence, durable goods, trade, the Chicago Fed national activity index and Chicago PMI and the Richmond Fed index.

The Bank of Japan and ECB will both hold policy meetings on Thursday.

In Australia, march quarter CPI is due on Wednesday and PPI on Friday, and the RBA governor will speak on Thursday. Monthly private sector credit numbers are also due.

On the local stock front, next week sees production reports from BHP Billiton ((BHP)) and South32 ((S32)) and quarterly updates from Mirvac Group ((MGR)), Stockland ((SGP)) and Lend Lease ((LLC)) as well as Computershare ((CPU)).

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