Monetary policy decisions, gross domestic product prints, and inflation readings will be highlighted in Asia this week.
After the People's Bank of China unexpectedly slashed major key rates, investors now await the Monetary Authority of Singapore's July policy statement.
Market participants are also monitoring South Korea's advanced second-quarter GDP reading and inflation prints from Singapore, Tokyo, and Malaysia, as well as trade figures from Hong Kong and Thailand.
Offshore, the focus will be the US Q2 gross domestic product data.
Here's what to keep an eye on in the next five days.
Monday
In a surprise move, the PBoC reduced the seven-day reverse repo rate, a key policy rate, by 10 basis points to 1.7%. The one-year and five-year loan prime rates, the nation's benchmark lending rates, were also lowered by 10bps to 3.35% and 3.85%, respectively.
"Today's cut is surprising as the US-China yield gap is still elevated. It is likely due to weaker-than-expected Q2 data and the increasing odds for a Fed cut this Sep," Macquarie said in a July 22 note.
"China's growth momentum slowed sharply in 2Q24... To achieve the around 5% GDP growth target, policymakers need to step up policy supports and today's rate cut sent a strong pro-growth signal. In fact, the same thing also happened a year ago - after receiving the worse-than-expected 2Q23 data, the PBoC cut its policy rate in Aug last year," Larry Hu, chief China economist at Macquarie, said Monday.
In Hong Kong, overall consumer prices rose 1.5% in June from a year ago, accelerating from 1.2% in May, official data showed. The uptick in inflation was driven by the decrease in the government's provision of electricity charges subsidy.
Meanwhile, the growth in Taiwan's export orders moderated to 3.1% in June from 7.0% a month prior. The print missed consensus estimates of a 12.5% expansion.
The sharp slowdown was caused by easing demand for chemicals, plastics and rubbers, electronic products, and information and communication products. Concurrently, orders fell for Taiwanese textile products, electrical machinery, and transport equipment.
Lastly, New Zealand exports totaled NZ$6.17 billion in June, down from May's NZ$7 billion tally. Imports dropped to NZ$5.47 billion from NZ$6.94 billion. As a result, the trade surplus soared to NZ$699 million from NZ$204 million.
Tuesday
Singapore will release inflation data for June, and the headline reading could "nudge a little higher from the 3.1% rate recorded for May, though we expect the MAS' core rate to remain at 3.1% YoY for a fourth consecutive month," ING Bank said in a note.
South Korea will publish its producer prices, which Trading Economics projects to have grown 2.6% YoY in June.
Taiwan's industrial production and retail sales data will also be available on Tuesday.
Wednesday
Malaysia's June inflation rate is due on Wednesday. The consensus is 2.1%, up from 2.0% in May.
The Australia Judo Bank July Flash PMI, Japan Jibun Bank Flash PMI, and India HSBC Flash PMI readouts will be available midweek, as will Korea consumer confidence and Taiwan's unemployment data.
Thursday
South Korea's GDP growth is expected to have decelerated in the second quarter of 2024.
Morgan Stanley sees a 0.3% quarter-on-quarter and 2.1% YoY expansion, a sharp slowdown from the 1.3% QoQ and 3.3% YoY growth in the January to March period.
"While we see continued strength in real exports, consumption likely contracted due to both the base effect and slowdown in retail sales amid a prolonged elevated interest rate environment. Investments likely also weakened on the constructiondownturn and non-tech manufacturing slowdown," Morgan Stanley said in a note.
Trade figures from Thailand and Hong Kong, as well as South Korea's business confidence data, will also be published on Thursday.
Friday
Data is projected to show that core consumer inflation in Japan's capital has accelerated again.
Tokyo core CPI for July is expected to inch up to 2.2% from 2.1% in June. The Tokyo inflation data is a leading indicator of the national price trend and will come a week before the Bank of Japan's meeting.
Analysts at ING expect "Tokyo core inflation to rise above the BoJ's target. Together with strong wage growth, a recovery in the auto sector, and retail sales, the BoJ is expected to deliver a 15bp hike at its July meeting."
Singapore will release preliminary retail unemployment data for the second quarter alongside its June industrial production report.
Separately, the city-state's de-facto central bank will release its July monetary policy statement.
"We expect [MAS] to keep all policy settings unchanged, to narrow the forecast range for GDP from 1-3% to 2-3%, but for core and headline inflation forecasts for 2024 to remain 2.5% to 3.5%, though there is some upside risk to that view. We are anticipating that the path of the SGD NEER will remain at its current growth rate of about 0.5% quarter-on-quarter until the October meeting, when we expect it to be reduced to around 0.25% QoQ," ING said in a note.
Offshore, the US advance Q2 GDP report will be released on Thursday, July 25, which is Friday evening in Asia time.
CommBank Research is anticipating a seasonally adjusted annual growth rate of 1.6%.
Saturday
China's industrial profits likely climbed 3.2% year over year in the six-month period from January to June, according to Trading Economics.
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