The Bank of Canada is meeting this morning with its latest monetary policy decision and statement due at 10:00 am. Central banks around the world usually try to stay out of politics and with a federal election campaign underway, the likelihood of the bank doing anything this time is pretty much zero. The bank has been tapering its asset purchase program in recent months so investors may look to the statement for hints on when tapering may resume, and for comments on the health of the economy through the summer.
Investors may also look to tomorrow’s European Central Bank meeting for tapering hints and its economic outlook. For the US, this afternoon’s Fed Beige Book regional economic report at 2:00 pm EDT may be of some interest to investors. The Canadian Ivey PMI report (previous 59.8) is due at 10:00 am EDT today.
US indies futures are flat this morning as markets try to regain their footing after staring off the week with a step backward that saw the Dow fall 0.7% and the S&P 500 dip 0.3%. Commodity action is mixed with WTI crude oil rebounding 1.2% but copper falling another 0.7%. Currencies are pretty quiet with the exception of Bitcoin which is down another 0.9% falling toward $46,500 in follow-through after $50,000 gave way yesterday.
