Aurelia Butler

The figure is slightly lower than the $47 billion in insured losses incurred in the first half of 2022, but higher than the 10-year average of $34 billion, according to Munich Re, the world’s largest reinsurer.Including uninsured losses, the figure came to $110 billion in the first half of the year – also significantly above the 10-year average.The earthquake in Turkey and Syria, in which some 58,000 people were killed, was the largest contributor to insured and uninsured losses incurred in the first half of 2023 at $40 billion.A series of severe thunderstorms in the U.S. brought destructive tornadoes and hailstorms that resulted in $35 billion in insured and uninsured losses, according to Munich Re.Though the El Nino weather pattern is contributing to higher temperatures, Rauch said that “the global trend towards higher water and air temperatures is predominantly driven by climate change – with increasing weather catastrophes and financial burdens as a result.” More

Here’s a look at the week ahead in markets from Li Gu in Shanghai, Amanda Cooper, Lawrence White and Dhara Ranasinghe in London, and Ira Iosebashvili in New York1/KEEP CALM AND BET ON STERLINGWhen the Bank of England meets on Aug 2, policymakers will finally have something to cheer about. Inflation hasn’t accelerated since February and there are signs that widespread price pressures are starting to abate.But the BoE has been routinely accused of being behind the curve. It’s taken policymakers eight months to bring inflation down to 7.9%, from a peak of 11.1%. It took the ECB half that time to achieve the same rate of decline. Money markets show traders think the odds are split on a 25-bp or a 50-bp hike. Investors are all too aware of how much more work the BoE has to do. After all, they’re holding the most valuable bullish bet on sterling since 2014.Meanwhile, markets will also work through the fallout from the Bank of Japan’s move on Friday to make its yield curve control policy more flexible and water down its commitment to defend a cap on long-term interest rates. 2/ DATA-DEPENDENT    The Fed appears to have gone into data-dependent mode after hiking rates 25 bps on Wednesday to 5.25-5.50% – a level last seen just before 2007 housing crash. Between now and its next meeting in September, the Fed gets two sets of jobs data – and inflation numbers – to pore over.     First up is July non-farm payrolls on Aug. 4.    Resilient jobs growth has been a key factor in shaping investors’ benign outlook on the U.S. economy, a view that – along with ebbing inflation – has helped drive rallies in stocks and other risk assets this year.     Signs of an overly robust labour market could spark worries that the Fed needs to keep tightening monetary policy to contain inflation. Conversely, a steep drop-off in employment might rekindle recession fears.     Megacaps Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) and Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN) meanwhile are expected to report earnings on Aug. 3. 3/ GONE TILL SEPTEMBER Markets are impatient. The ECB just hiked rates – as expected – again and the ‘will they’ or ‘won’t they’ lift rates in September debate is well under way.So even as rate-setters head for a break, data will still push around rate bets, starting with Monday’s preliminary estimate of July euro zone inflation and second quarter GDP.Overall inflation is now just half its October peak, but harder-to-break underlying price growth is hovering near historic highs and may have even accelerated again. Both measures remain above the ECB’s 2% inflation target.Economists polled by Reuters forecast the euro zone economy grew 0.2% in Q2. GDP was flat in Q1 versus the previous quarter.The data could strengthen the case for a September hike. Not so fast, ECB doves might argue. After all, forward-looking indicators such as PMIs are pointing decidedly lower. 4/HOPING TO HSBC SOME IMPROVEMENTHSBC on Tuesday closes out a mixed reporting season for big European banks, with investment banking revenues still dwindling as deal activity slumps, while rising rates lift more staid business lines such as corporate and retail banking.Investors are hoping for a fresh share buyback after HSBC announced a $2 billion offer last quarter and resumed paying quarterly dividends for the first time since 2019. They will also look for an increase to the bank’s conservative-looking $34 billion net interest income forecast. HSBC investors have long awaited the promised land, where rising central bank interest rates lift margins from lending against its vast deposit base, but the picture is clouded in Britain by political pressure to pay stressed savers more.And China’s precarious economic recovery could in turn revive fears about HSBC’s nearly $10 billion exposure to the overextended commercial real state sector.5/NOT SO HOT PROPERTY? Hopes for stimulus from Beijing for China’s embattled property sector are well and alive, if property shares in Hong Kong and the mainland at multi-week highs are anything to go by.Removing the phrase “houses are for living, not for speculation” from a readout of the powerful politburo meeting fuelled those hopes, but there’s been a distinct lack of concrete detail. A booming property market is seen as key to igniting lacklustre missing consumer spending in post-pandemic China. But Beijing will be wary. Memories of previous property sector bubbles are fresh and developers are still feeling the fallout. Sino-Ocean Group is considering a debt deferral, Dalian Wanda Commercial Management almost defaulted, and Country Garden faces mounting payment pressures in the coming months. Purchasing manager surveys in days to come are likely to offer few promising signs, after Thursday’s industrial profits numbers extend the double-digit pace of declines into a sixth month. More

FRANKFURT (Reuters) -Two European Central Bank policymakers on Friday raised the prospect of an end to the ECB’s steepest and longest string of interest rate rises, as the outlook for the euro zone economy worsened despite stubbornly high inflation.The ECB increased borrowing costs for a ninth consecutive time on Thursday but raised the possibility of a pause in September as recession worries mount. ECB policymakers Yannis Stournaras and Peter Kazimir both said the end of the tightening cycle was near, although they differed on whether one more rate hike was likely.”It looks like we are very close to the end of interest rate rises,” Stournaras, the Greek central bank governor and a policy dove who favours lower rates, told capital.gr.”In any case, if there is one further (rise)- I see it difficult – in September, I believe we will stop there.”His more hawkish Slovakian colleague Kazimir also said the ECB was “nearing the completion” of its rate hikes but called for “a firm step further”.”Even if we were to take a break in September, it would be premature to consider it automatically … the end of the cycle,” the Slovak governor said.Kazimir and Stournaras both said the ECB was unlikely to cut rates for several months after its last increase, a view echoed by their Lithuanian peer Gediminas Simkus. “We are looking for the right place to stay for a large part of next year,” said Kazimir. “And you will recognise that it has to be a place where we all must like it a little.”In a likely nod to divisions among the ECB’s 26 rate-setters, he said this was proving “challenging with such a large expedition as the Governing Council.”DIFFICULT HANDSurveys on Friday showed ECB policymakers have been dealt a difficult hand.Core inflation in the euro zone was seen coming down more slowly than previously thought, with wage growth expected to pick up in a tight labour market.But growth forecasts were revised down for the next two years as well as in the longer term and companies were recording stagnating activity, with no improvement in sight. Sentiment in the industrial sector kept worsening too. Hard data, which reflects the recent past rather than the present or the outlook, provided some comfort. Inflation fell in Germany and France, the euro zone’s two largest economies, in July.GDP readings also showed the French and Spanish economies grew at a sustained pace in the second quarter of the year on the back of stronger exports and tourism.Industry-heavy Germany stagnated, however, and remained the worst-performer among major euro zone economies. More

French inflation slowed to its lowest annual rate for 16 months, prompting investors to pare back their bets of another rate rise from the European Central Bank. Lower energy costs in the eurozone’s second-largest economy lay behind a fall in inflation to 5 per cent in July, bolstering expectations of a decline in the regional number, which is due out on Monday.In a further positive sign, the French economy rebounded in the three months to June, growing at a faster than expected 0.5 per cent from the previous quarter. Inflation also looked likely to have fallen in Germany, after Europe’s biggest economy stagnated in the second quarter. The flatlining of German gross domestic product was an improvement from declines in the previous two quarters, but was below the 0.1 per cent growth forecast by economists in a Reuters poll. Robert Habeck, German economy minister, said the latest figures were “far from satisfactory”.Regional German data pointed to a cooling of overall consumer price growth in the country to 6.6 per cent in July, down from 6.8 per cent in June, according to Goldman Sachs. Full inflation figures for Germany are due later on Friday.Germany’s rate-sensitive two-year bond yield dipped on Friday and the euro fell 0.2 per cent against the dollar as markets pared back their bets of another rate rise from the ECB in September. However, inflation in Spain accelerated, rising more than expected to 2.1 per cent, up from 1.6 per cent in the previous quarter.Policymakers at the ECB will be watching today’s data closely after leaving the door open to a pause in a year-long period of interest rate rises in September, following a quarter-percentage point increase on Thursday.While eurozone headline inflation is expected to keep falling, the ECB is concerned about tight job markets and rising wages, particularly in the labour-intensive services sector. Its decision on whether to raise rates again at its next meeting in September could hinge on whether consumer price growth keeps slowing over the next two months.“The drivers of inflation are changing,” ECB president Christine Lagarde said on Thursday. “External sources of inflation are easing. By contrast, domestic price pressures, including from rising wages and still robust profit margins, are becoming an increasingly important driver of inflation.”Energy prices in France fell 3.8 per cent in the year to July. Coupled with a slowdown in food inflation and in manufactured goods inflation, this helped to offset a slight increase in services inflation. Compared with the previous month, French consumer prices were flat.The acceleration of French quarterly growth, up from 0.2 per cent in the first quarter, was above economists’ expectations and signalled GDP figures for the eurozone, which are also due out on Monday, could be stronger than expected.Insee, the French statistics agency, said business investment was up 0.7 per cent in the second quarter while household spending was down 0.4 per cent. There was a boost from the country’s balance of trade growth as exports rose 2.6 per cent and imports were up only 0.4 per cent.However, economists said the downturn in French domestic demand could still point to weakness in the wider eurozone economy. Claus Vistesen, an economist at consultants Pantheon Macroeconomics, said the “main impetus” to French growth was the “delivery of a cruise ship”, which boosted exports of transport equipment.French goods consumption fell 0.7 per cent in the second quarter, despite a rebound in May and June, Insee said. Spain’s economy grew 0.4 per cent in the three months to June from the previous quarter, a slowdown from its 0.5 per cent expansion earlier in the year that matched economists’ expectations. The country, which is gripped by political deadlock after an inconclusive election left both main parties struggling to form a government, was boosted by a rebound in domestic demand, which expanded 1.9 per cent, offsetting a negative contribution from trade after exports fell 4.1 per cent.Additional reporting by Guy Chazan in Berlin More