All week what the market has said
Is fears in re China are dead
But last night it seems
The latest of memes
Showed fear is still somewhat widespread

This morning the payroll report
If strong, ought, the dollar, support
The US this week
Has been on a streak
While Europe keeps coming up short

After a week where early fears about the spread of the coronavirus morphed into a belief that any issues would be contained and have only a short term impact on the global economy, it seems that some investors and traders are having second thoughts. For the first time since last Friday, equity markets around the world have fallen, albeit not very far, and risk is starting to be unloaded. Certainly, this could well be short-term profit taking. After all, since Friday’s close on the S&P 500, the index was higher by nearly 4% as of last night, and pretty much in a straight line. The remarkable thing about the equity rally, which was truly global in nature, was that it very studiously ignored the ongoing growth of the epidemic and its economic impacts.

Last night, however, it seems the announcements by Toyota and Honda that they would extend their mainland Chinese factory shutdowns by another week, as well as the force majeure declarations by Chinese energy and copper companies have served to highlight just how severely economic activity in China is slowing. Alas, the human impact continues its steady climb higher, with more than 600 deaths now attributed to the virus and more than 31,000 cases confirmed. It certainly appears as the situation has not yet reached anything near a peak, which implies that more market impacts are still to come.

One of the things we are beginning to see is a more significant reduction in expectations for Chinese economic activity this year. Last night, several more analysts reduced their expectations for Q1 GDP growth there by more than 2%. Given the fact that China has quarantined some 90 million people at this point, which is a remarkable 6.5% of the population, I expect that before all is said and done, Q1 GDP growth in China is going to be much lower, probably on the order of 2% annualized. In fact, I would not be surprised if the Chinese don’t release a Q1 number at all. There is precedent for this as just last night, the customs administration there announced that there would be no January trade data release, and that the numbers would be merged with February’s data to smooth out the impact of the Lunar New Year. Assuming the virus situation is under control by the end of Q1, it would be well within the Chinese prerogative to do the same with that data, hopefully masking just how bad things were.

In the end, there was nothing positive to be learned from Asia last night, which was confirmed by weakness in both equity markets throughout the region as well as the FX markets, where every currency in the APAC group fell. And all of this movement is directly attributable to the virus story.

Moving westward to Europe, things are looking no better there this morning, with equity markets lower across the board and their currencies also under pressure. NOK is the worst performer, down 0.6% as fears over further weakness in the oil market are weighing on the currency. But, the euro is feeling more heat today as well; down 0.25% after IP data from everywhere in the Eurozone was markedly disappointing. Germany (-3.5%), France (-2.8%), Spain (-1.4%) and the Netherlands (-1.7%) demonstrated that a risk of a recession remains quite real on the continent. In fact, you may recall how Germany barely dodged that recession status in Q4, when GDP rose 0.1% in a bit of a surprise. Well, right now, Q1 looks like it is going to be negative again. It seems to me that if a country has three negative GDP prints in six quarters, with the other three quarters printing around +0.1%, that could easily be defined as a recession. But regardless of how it is described in print, the reality is that Germany has not come out of its funk yet, and it may be dragging the rest of Europe down with it.

But there is something else ongoing in the euro which is likely to have been a significant part of the currency’s recent weakness. Recall that LVMH has agreed to buy Tiffany’s for ~$16.5 billion. Well, LVMH issued both EUR (7.5 billion) and GBP (1.5 billion) bonds this week to pay for the purchase, which means that there was a massive conversion in both currencies that is a one-way flow. And as large as these markets are, a significant dollar purchase like that is going to have a major impact. As I wrote earlier this week, the euro is leaning heavily on support at 1.0950, and if it manages to break through, there is nothing technically in the way until 1.0850. If you are a payables hedger, this could be an excellent opportunity.

Turning to the US, this morning is payrolls day. After Wednesday’s blowout 291K number for ADP Employment, expectations are running high that things are going to be quite good. The current median forecasts are as follows:

Source: Bloomberg

A quick look at the revisions in NFP estimates since the ADP number shows that the average is now 180K. As I said, expectations are running high. And given the strength of US data we have seen all week, if we do get a strong number, I expect to see the dollar break higher, likely taking out technical resistance in a number of currencies.

To recap, we have a risk-off session leading up to a key economic indicator. It will be interesting to see if strong US data can offset the growing fear of further negative news from china, but ironically, I think that the dollar is likely to be in demand regardless of the outcome. A weak number implies a potential negative impact from the virus, and risk-off which helps the dollar. A strong number means that the US remains above the fray, and that US investments are poised to continue to lead the world, thus drawing in more dollar buyers. Either way, the dollar seems primed to rally further today.

Good luck and good weekend
Adf