Aurelia Butler

$75 per monthComplete digital access to quality FT journalism with expert analysis from industry leaders. Pay a year upfront and save 20%.What’s included Global news & analysisExpert opinionFT App on Android & iOSFT Edit appFirstFT: the day’s biggest stories20+ curated newslettersFollow topics & set alerts with myFTFT Videos & Podcasts20 monthly gift articles to shareLex: FT’s flagship investment column15+ Premium newsletters by leading expertsFT Digital Edition: our digitised print edition More

(Reuters) – A look at the day ahead in Asian markets. Investors go into Wednesday’s market trading in Asia with their appetite for risk smothered by the rise in global bond yields.As ever, U.S. Treasury yields are front and center for markets that are more exposed than most to dollar-denominated debt and U.S. borrowing costs. Especially on medium- to longer-dated maturities.The 10-year U.S. yield is its highest in eight months, the ‘2s/10s’ curve is the steepest in nearly three years, and the 30-year yield is within 10 basis points of 5.00%. It has climbed 60 bps in a month.Longer-dated yields are rising globally even though many central banks are lowering policy rates – Britain’s 30-year gilt yield is the highest since 1998. The U.S. Treasury’s sale on Wednesday of $22 billion of 30-year bonds could have a major impact on world markets.There are times when signs of U.S. economic resilience lift the global outlook and risk appetite picks up, but the release of surprisingly strong U.S. job opening figures on Tuesday was not one of them. It was a case of ‘good news is bad news’, U.S. yields and the dollar rose, and stocks tumbled.That’s the global backdrop for Wednesday’s trading, which is likely to set the tone in Asia given how light the local economic calendar is. There is little sign that Japan’s yen or China’s yuan is emerging from their recent funk, and currency traders in Asia will be on heightened alert for intervention from Japan after the dollar on Tuesday rose as high as 158.40 yen.That’s the highest since July last year and close to the psychologically significant 160.00 yen level, and comes after Japanese finance minister Katsunobu Kato on Tuesday warned against what he said is speculative, one-sided yen selling.Traders will note that a break of the 160 per dollar level prompted yen-buying intervention from Japanese authorities last year. The weak yen helped the Nikkei rise 2% back above 40,000 points on Tuesday but futures are pointing to a fall of as much as 1% at the open on Wednesday.The news flow around China, meanwhile, is still on the bleak side, offering investors little incentive to start buying beaten down Chinese assets. U.S. President-elect Donald Trump on Tuesday doubled down on his commitment to slap hefty tariffs on goods imported from major trading partners, and figures on Tuesday showed China’s FX reserves fell by $64 billion in December. That was the biggest monthly fall since April 2022, and one of the steepest since the yuan slide and waves of capital flight in 2015-16Chinese stocks are down 5% so far this year, significantly underperforming their regional and global peers. The yuan is its weakest against the dollar since September 2023, and Chinese bond yields are collapsing. Here are key developments that could provide more direction to markets on Wednesday:- Australia inflation (November)- South Korea current account (November)- Japan consumer confidence (December) More

SINGAPORE (Reuters) – The dollar stood tall on Wednesday and the yen sagged close to levels that drew intervention last year after strong U.S. data drove a spike in yields and pared some bets on Federal Reserve rate cuts.The yen touched 158.42 overnight, its weakest on the dollar for nearly six months, and last sat at 158.15.Japan Finance Minister Katsunobu Kato had warned against speculative yen selling a day earlier as the exchange rate nears the 160 level that drew dollar selling half a year ago.”Even chart wise it’s an important resistance level,” said Bart Wakabayashi, Tokyo branch manager at State Street (NYSE:STT).”We’re getting very strong U.S. numbers…which has rates going up,” he said, pushing expectations of Fed rate cuts out to the northern summer or beyond.”There’s even the discussion about will they cut or may they even hike? The narrative has changed quite significantly, leading to what should be maybe a bit more dollar strength.”The euro fell about 0.5% overnight and traded at $1.0345 early in the Asia day. Sterling had also dipped and bought $1.2478. China’s yuan was likely to open the onshore session under pressure, having touched a 16-month low earlier in the week. [CNY/]Traders have a wary eye on U.S. labour data due on Friday and on inauguration day on Jan. 20, when Donald Trump is expected to begin his second U.S. presidency with a flurry of policy announcements and executive orders.Overnight data showed U.S. job openings unexpectedly rose in November, layoffs were low, while services sector activity accelerated in December and a measure of prices paid for inputs hit a two-year high – a possible inflation warning.Bond markets reacted by sending 10-year yields up more than eight basis points to touch an eight-month high of 4.699%, while the 30-year yield rose 7.4 bps and is less than nine bps from breaching 5%. [US/]Traders price only about 37 bps of easing through this year, according to LSEG data derived from rates futures.The dollar followed suit and the contrast between the solid U.S. economy and weak data in Australia and New Zealand has the Antipodean currencies plumbing multi-year lows.New Zealand is in outright recession and, having lost more than 11% on the greenback last year, the kiwi huddled at $0.5636 on Wednesday, not far from a two-year low of $0.5588 struck late in December.The Australian dollar sank 9.2% on the dollar through 2024 and, at $0.6228, is not far from breaking a 2022 low of $0.6170. Australian monthly inflation data showed headline CPI crept up from three-year lows in November, though a drop in core inflation bolstered the case for a rate cut. More

SEOUL (Reuters) -Samsung Electronics released on Wednesday a fourth-quarter operating profit estimate that missed analyst estimates by a large margin, as it lagged behind rival SK Hynix in supplying high-end chips to Nvidia (NASDAQ:NVDA). The world’s largest memory chip, smartphone and TV maker estimated an operating profit of 6.5 trillion won ($4.47 billion) for the three months ended Dec. 31, versus a 7.7 trillion won LSEG SmartEstimate. The estimated result was 131% higher than the same period a year earlier, but down 29% from the third quarter. Samsung (KS:005930) shares were down 1% in early trading, while the broader South Korean market was up 0.1%.Samsung said in a statement that amid slowing demand for conventional memory chips used in PCs and mobile phones, its memory chip earnings for the fourth-quarter were dented by rising research and development costs and investments in manufacturing capacity for advanced chip processes. It also said earnings fell in its non-memory chip business, which spans contract chip manufacturing and logic chip design, due to lower utilisation rates at its factories and higher research and development costs. Earnings for its devices business, which includes mobile phones, TVs and household appliances, fell due to the fading effect of sales of new mobile phone models and rising competition, Samsung said.In October, the South Korean company made a rare apology for its disappointing third-quarter performance and said it was making progress in supplying artificial intelligence chips to Nvidia.But it has not provided any update since, and delays to providing Nvidia with high-end chips have continued to weigh on its earnings, analysts said. Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang told reporters in Las Vegas on Tuesday that Samsung has to “engineer a new design” to supply high-bandwidth memory (HBM) chips to Nvidia, adding that “they can do it and they are working very fast,” Korea JoongAng Daily reported. Samsung’s statement on Wednesday did not include any update on its progress in supplying HBM to Nvidia.($1 = 1,454.6000 won) More

LONDON (Reuters) – British luxury automaker Rolls-Royce (OTC:RYCEY) said on Wednesday it will invest 300 million pounds ($376 million) to expand its Goodwood plant to focus more on bespoke cars for high-end clients, featuring anything from gold sculptures to mother-of-pearl artwork. As with other high-end automakers, Rolls-Royce has seen rising demand for high-margin, personalized car content from wealthy consumers.In 2024 alone, the BMW (ETR:BMWG) unit said its “artisans crafted exquisite details” that included solid 18-carat gold sculptures, embroideries consisting of more than 869,500 stitches, wood veneers including 500 individually-shaped pieces of wood and holographic paint finishes. Rolls-Royce said that the Goodwood plant expansion is to serve customers for its Bespoke services and Coachbuild programme – an invitation-only service where wealthy clients get to “craft an entirely original motor car.”The investment is the largest since the plant opened in 2003, when it employed 300 people and made one car a day, the company said. Today, Goodwood employs 2,500 people and produces 28 cars daily, it said.Rolls-Royce also said that globally it sold 5,712 cars in 2024, a drop of more than 5% versus the 6,032 cars it sold in 2023, which it said was in line with its expectations as it switches over to new models.($1 = 0.7979 pounds) More

The U.S. IPO market has seen an uptick amid falling interest rates, strong equity markets, and hopes of a friendlier regulatory environment under the incoming Trump administration. Maze’s decision follows a strong 2024 for biotech companies, with firms such as Septerna and Bicara Therapeutics receiving a positive response from investors at their debut. Maze said it earned $9.03 million for the nine months ended Sept. 30, 2024, compared with a loss of $73.84 million in the year-ago period. The terms of the IPO were not disclosed in the offering. The San Francisco, California-based company is also backed by healthcare investors ARCH Venture Partners and General Catalyst. Maze is advancing two fully-owned lead programs, MZE829 and MZE782, both of which represent a “novel precision medicine-based” approach for chronic kidney disease. The funds raised from the IPO will be used to advance the clinical development of these lead programs. The company is also developing another program, MZE001, for a genetic disorder called Pompe disease through a partnership agreement with Japanese firm Shionogi. France-based healthcare company Sanofi (NASDAQ:SNY) had previously announced a global licensing agreement with Maze for MZE001 in May 2023. However, Sanofi later scrapped the agreement following an administrative complaint issued by the Federal Trade Commission, which cited the French firm’s monopoly in the treatment of Pompe disease. Maze Therapeutics intends to list its shares on the Nasdaq Global Market under the ticker symbol “MAZE”. J.P. Morgan, TD Cowen, Leerink Partners and Guggenheim Securities are the lead underwriters of the offering. More

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The White House on Tuesday unveiled a new label for smart thermostats, baby monitors, app-controlled lights and other internet-connected devices that will allow consumers to see how the increasingly popular items rate on cybersafety criteria. The Cyber Trust Mark – a stylized shield logo with microchip-style detailing – is meant to give American consumers a quick and easy way to evaluate the security of a given smart product, much like U.S. Department of Agriculture labels on food or Energy Star ratings on appliances.Companies seeking the label for their products must meet established cybersecurity criteria from the U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology via compliance testing by accredited labs.An increasing number of everyday devices are being connected to the internet: garage doors, fitness trackers, security cameras, voice-activated assistants and even ovens and trash cans, providing users with added convenience but introducing novel risks. “Each one of these devices presents a digital door that motivated cyber attackers are eager to enter,” U.S. Deputy National Security Advisor for Cyber Anne Neuberger told reporters on a call.The Cyber Trust Mark is voluntary. But Neuberger said she hoped “consumers will start asking for the label and saying, ‘Look, I don’t want to connect another device in my home, a camera, a baby monitor that risks my privacy.'”She said the government plans to start with consumer devices such as cameras before moving on to home and office routers and smart meters. Products bearing the label should be hitting store shelves sometime this year, she said. The White House is also planning an executive order in the final days of the administration of President Joe Biden that will restrict the U.S. government to only buying Cyber Trust Mark products beginning in 2027. The program has bipartisan support, she added. More