>> this is daybreak asia, we are counting down to asia's major market opens. haidi: was to contend with, we have japan, the number surprising, slipping into recession, clouds of the way forward for the bank of japan, particularly with how strong the yen has been. we are also looking across the continued percolation of said messaging and how that side of things affects markets. or uplift today. paul: japan is interesting, the numbers unexpected. is this stagflation or are we doing violence to the word? earnings out of australia as well. haidi: some of those earnings clouded the broader macro outlook into some concerns about the fed's trajectory. let's get you straight to the start of trading in japan. ahead of that, we have more breaking news, numbers out of

singapore. gdp numbers for singapore at 1.2%, this is slightly softer on the headline. one point 2%, seasonally adjusted quarter on quarter, xbase -- expectations were 1.4%. year on year, the headline number, 2.2%. a mess on expectations of 2.5%. these are the fourth quarter final readings. a pullback from the previous period as well. the annual gdp year on year, 1.1%. that was full the -- for the full year. a little bit of softening. we are seeing some signs of weakness over the past year, there's been some hope from the prime minister that the strength of the recovery across industries like construction and retail and services will help

support the broader economic recovery. let's get you to trading in japan in the first few minutes of trading. this as we continue to process the data showing japan's economy unexpectedly contracted for a second quarter at the end of 2023, meaning it slipped into recession. this is the first two straight quarters of slippage since the 18. it creates questions about how the back of japan times the first rate increase, the end of negative rates. that's also complicated by the weakness in the yen. we might see more support for the end. gdp shrinking at an annualized pace of 4/10 of a percent. the last three-month, the revised 3.5% of contraction. japan's economy slipping to the fourth largest in the world, just behind germany now. we are still seeing pretty reasonable gains for the nikkei

225, up about 7/10 of 1%. still a couple percent away from getting to the december 1989 hi, so probably won't be hitting that in this session. dollar-yen holding steady at the 150 level. looking at korea as well, in a lot of ways this has been the strongest stock story, almost more than the rally we have seen in japan. that's really on account of the turnaround, going from asia's worst-performing market to the best, a lot of these hopes on regulatory reforms, and driven by inflows from overseas investors. the equity benchmark for korea has become asia's best-performing gauge this month, more than $4 billion of local shares scripted by global investors in korea. paul: plenty going on in markets. let's look at australia, asx a

real mixed bag. the world's biggest mining company not having a great day, off by 1.5% off by 1.25%. -- off by 1.25%. wesfarmers, origin with strong earnings reports. at the bottom of the hour we will be bringing you jobs data out of australia. if it is 4% it will be a two-year high. u.s. crude inventories have risen a little more than expected, 12 million barrels, the most since november. standard chartered has been saying they see brent exceeding $90 a barrel. looking at u.s. treasuries, slight decline in yields.

we heard from the chicago fed earlier talking about the cpi numbers out of the u.s. he said slightly higher inflation data, don't worry about it, it still consistent with the central bank's. let's -- central banks goal. let's get to our guest, from oc bc bank. i want to start in japan if we can, we just had rather disappointing gdp numbers, i know you are quite bullish on the japan rally, a lot of it fueled by the wiki in. -- weak yen. you think japanese stocks have more gas in the tank? vasu: we think there is upside. the way the nick it is responding today, -- nikkei is responding today. perhaps the bank of japan will not increase interest rates in

any significant way this year, even if it does once or twice, it won't do anything as aggressive as the fed. that is seen as a win for japanese equities. i think you have significant corporate governance reforms have taken place in japan the last several years. a weaker yen, is your monetary policy, corporate earnings, valuations, you put that together is still makes the case for more upside on japanese equities compared to u.s. equities. paul: just want to get more of your thoughts on the next moves for the bank of japan. to what degree is there a spanner in the works for the normalization for policy? vasu: it's still possible the bank of japan could lift rates in april. that's our best case. i don't think the gdp numbers

hit expectations. don't expect them to continue to increase interest rates and a conservative fashion. i think they will hike rates once or just once, and watch. japan has been mired in inflation for a long time. i think the boj will be careful and tread cautiously pure it's quite clear, the governor said last week monetary policy will remain accommodative. implying that rate hikes will not be significant even if they happen anytime soon. haidi: what about china as we start to see hong kong and china coming back online after the lunar near -- lunar your holidays be a d.c. prospects for more stimulus and policymakers delivering what investors have been asking for?

vasu: it's a tall order, the policymakers have been announcing piecemeal stimulus measures. they've been getting more involved in the economic management of the country. the npc is coming up soon. china will probably have more stimulus down the road. the big question is whether they will do the bazooka, something that will provide a backstop for the ailing property market. it's hard for the chinese market to rebound in a sustainable fashion. haidi: that is a positive watch. what about the u.s. at the moment? when using of the valuations given what the fed may deliver? vasu: overall valuation seem high but that's partly because

technology stocks have done extremely well. they form a big component of the s&p 500 and some other u.s. indices good you take away the technology sector, the valuations are not as high. i think the technology story is intact. we see more upside on u.s. equities. the fed will take the lead in cutting rates and the u.s. market is a major stock market. individual investors are cash rich so money will gravitate toward the largest stock market in the world in one way or another as interest rates come down. paul: that sounds like a bullish outlook but you still see a mild recession in 2024. why is that? vasu: we see the potential for mild recession in 2024, possibly

in the second half of the year for the u.s., because interest rates have increased significantly. they've gone up more than 5% since 2022. that's going to have an effect on the economy. we haven't seen it just yet but we think it could happen. the positive take away is it will be a mild recession because the corporate sector, consumers and households have strong balance sheets. put that together, the economy won't fall off the cliff but it will slow down and possibly slip into negative territory but come out of it fairly quickly. we don't think it is a game changer for equity investors. haidi: always great to talk with you. let's get you a quick check of some of the movers we are watching early, about 10 minutes in the start of cash training. this is a semi conductor maker, trading softer, 3.3% lower.

they agreed to buy a design software firm, a 34% premium to the last share price. they are based in san diego. they will be acquiring shares for the cash price of 68.50 aussie dollars apiece good we are also watching -- apiece. we are also watching sony. partially preparing to spin off its financial unit, shares not reacting kindly. this is part of the broader focus plan on the growth of its other priority businesses. the company reversing course after taking private in 2020, but also concerned about underwhelming playstation 5 sales. that led to the outlook cut we

are seeing, that stuck under pressure today. paul: a big mover in south korea, kakao up by 11% on a strong fourth quarter earnings report, operating profit 189 billion won, about 40 billion more than expected. sales were a slight miss but the total business revenue also to claim slightly and gain revenue decline, but music revenue up more than 100%. earnings report from kakao. let's look at rocket 10 -- rak uten as well. they beat the average analysts estimate. shares responding very positively. still to come, donald trump said

to be considering scaled-back commitments to some nato members if he gets reelected. we will have more on that later in the hour. first, prabowo subianto let to become indonesia's next president. ♪ when you automate sales tax with avalara, you don't have to worry about things like changing tax rates or filing returns. avalarahhh ahhh hey! sarah! if you had to choose would you listen to elevator music all day or deal with payroll compliance?

payroll compliance, for sure. gusto automatically calculates and files my taxes for me. hold up, compliance? easier? choose payroll compliance without the ups and downs. and your store was also the first time you realized... well, we can do anything. cheesecake cookies? the chookie! manage all your sales from one place with a partner that always puts you first. (we did it) start today at godaddy.com wealth-changing question -- are you keeping as much of your investment gains as possible? high taxes can erode returns quickly, so you need a tax-optimized portfolio. at creative planning, our money managers and specialists work together to make sure your portfolio and wealth are managed in a tax-efficient manner. it's what you keep that really matters. why not give your wealth a second look? book your free meeting today at creativeplanning.com. creative planning -- a richer way to wealth.

haidi: rate cuts overseas will have implications for rba policy, the governor said today in testimony. it is a treat in a guess a new normal from the rba -- normal to have so much communication from the rbi head.

>> this senate appearance was a week after a longer parliamentary appearance that went on for three hours. this one was shorter. it also involved smaller parties so the questions were obscure. they were asking her questions about the government's tax cuts, about price gouging by companies, and whether that is responsible for inflation. there were a lot of questions about what is happening overseas. it was reiterated that services inflation remain even although we've seen falling of goods inflation. she tried to reiterate the hawkish message as well. paul: a lot of what happens is beyond the control of the rba. did she have to say about overseas countries easing policy and growth outlook and china? >> she thought it was good for

australia's economy if countries overseas or cutting interest rates because that pushes the australian dollar relatively higher, which is positive for inflationary outcome for australia. she said they are looking at what other countries are doing, inflationary trends overseas. and she believes australia is also seeing similar trends as the u.s., where services is taking longer. she noted that they would look closely at what the fed would do. haidi: how costly are they watching china given historically such a close correlated a economy? strongly a -- australia has done pretty well. >> not a lot of discussion around china but it was

mentioned that with china's economy slowing down, on paper that has implications for australia but china has been buying a lot of iron ore and coal. there was data recently that showed after the tariffs were removed, china became the top buyer of australian barley as well. we've benefited from china's demand and the fact china is continuing to pay top dollar for australian goods. trade surplus yes, but another budget surplus likely as well. paul: indonesia's defense minister, prabowo subianto, has declared victory in the elections. unofficially. officially he is on course to leave the economy. our correspondent joins us from jakarta. haslinda: indonesia, a new

president, and general with a checkered past about to take power. let's get to our correspondent here, it was quite an interesting take. the tone, the speech, the messaging. >> you have rightly pointed all of that out. compared to 2019 when he lost to jokowi, he prematurely declared victory, he was fiery, he threatened social unrest, calling on supporters to take to the streets. last night it was completely different. he told supporters they need to be humble and protect all indonesians, including those who did not vote for him.

also he talked about that, and he waited till most -- almost 100% of the votes have been counted. haslinda: he was presidential. but we've seen the real p rabowo. you wonder which will emerge as the real president. >> i think we will see that in days or weeks to come because he's very close to becoming president. i think what's interesting is he saw what happened in his campaign and indonesians were embracing that rows a wing -- rousing prabowo and lead the

country to better economic prospects. haslinda: jokowi played a huge part, some said it meant 20% additional votes for prabowo. how has jokowi become so powerful and how he is he likely to continue to play a role? >> if you remember, you interviewed president jokowi last year and you asked what are your plans after you step down in october? he was like i want to spend more time with my family, play a bigger role in the environment. he also said plans might change. i do think his plans have changed. what you saw in the presidential election yesterday is number one, the jokowi outsized influence. i think it answered a lot of the

critics questions that he is in bigger than his ruling party. for years the ruling party has mocked him. they have questioned that he would not be where he was without them. but he showed and also his contribution to the votes to prabowo, he secured close to 60%, that was higher than jokowi got in the last two victories when he won the presidency. it also shows that indonesians want to the path that they are on right now, more pragmatic, more focused on economic growth, less instability. and because prabowo promised he will continue the jokowi policies, it will not be a massive deviation. people want that. the third point, adding to the jokowi factor, it's also because maybe indonesians have not seen the alternatives as inspiring

enough. why break it? why fix it? haslinda: exactly, when it is not broken, it is about economy and continuing policies. there you have it, covering the indonesian election along with our team. we are awaiting the official result to be announced in a couple of weeks hopefully. paul, haidi? haidi: haslinda amin there. really dissecting the salts of the indonesian election, the preliminary results. our live coverage continues and we will speak with guests including from the prabowo campaign and former trade minister. this is bloomberg. ♪

paul: ford motor's says chinese ev vehicles are a colossal threat that will eventually arrive on u.s. shores. keith, why does ford seek chinese ev's as a threat? keith: they have huge cost advantage. the byb seagull for example cost 11 thousand dollars. the worry is they will undercut everyone on price and take over the market. haidi: why are we also hearing chinese automakers are looking at building ev's in mexico? keith: president trump during his administration imposed a 27.5% tariff on chinese made

ev's if they were imported directly to the united states. china is finding a workaround. byb is apparently looking for a factory site in mexico, several suppliers have already set up shop in mexico. they can come into the united states through the u.s. see him -- uscm trade agreement. paul: we've got some involvement from tesla as well, encouraging chinese auto suppliers to set up in mexico. what is happening there? keith: tesla has a giant gigafactory in shanghai, that's how they've penetrated the chinese market. they have a great group of suppliers and they are encouraging those suppliers to come to mexico, where tesla is building another new gigafactory to build its low-cost model. those chinese suppliers are setting up shop around that factory and that is building the

chinese auto and auto supply base in mexico, which is really growing. haidi: our autos reporter there in detroit. take a look at how futures and europe are opening at the moment. we see a little more of an uplift in the asian session, so potentially a bit of a positive handover as we get into the start of trading in europe. we did see an advance in the wednesday session after the slide on tuesday. we saw the u.k. benchmark outperforming on bets that the boe will deliver on rate cuts. european futures from germany to the euro stoxx 50 looking positive right now. this is bloomberg. ♪

>> you are seeing live pictures

of sydney harbor, awaiting the australian jobs numbers for the month of january. normally, it is on time and they are a little late today. the expectation is for the rate two up to 4%. if that happens, that would amount to a two year high. we had heard from them recently saying that the labor market is remaining tight, and the central bank is not ruling out further tightening. we are seeing the dollar dipping lower, which suggests we are going to see a bit of a move with numbers just dropping now. employment change or arise in employment numbers for december, and they are coming in backwards, contraction of 62,000 jobs back in december. that is an improvement on the 65 thousand job contraction that we saw that month, but we still

don't have those january numbers, but you do see the aussie dollar hedging lower, .6482. the jobless rate taking up higher than expected, 4.1%. that is going to really change the dynamics for the reserve bank. that is a much higher reading than we anticipated, and it suggests that pricing will probably rise and the next move from the rba is going to be down. full-time employment change, still getting an audit number, arising, 1000 jobs for january, and the participation rate, that has declined slightly, the number of people looking for work, 66.8%. the headline, the unemployment rate picking up more than expected to 4.1%, losing a little ground. later on, timely, and we get the numbers, we will speak to the

ceo of the firm's -- of west mayor's -- westmers' rob scott at 12:30 p.m. hong kong time. haidi: let's look at how this is playing into markets. and that missed when it comes to the job numbers you just went through, paul, really having a play when it comes to the equities and fx. equities, the 600 extending that game to almost 1% after that jobs data, and we also see that fall back on the aussie dollar, giving back the earlier strength we saw, and it misses estimates. we have also been hearing from the government, talking about the inflation expectations being well anchored at 2.5%, but flagging concerns about them coming unanchored, on the downside risks, including the chinese slowed. so on the balance of this

potential market expectations, a little bit of a push and perhaps we have a softer than expected approach when it comes to the risk of further hike when it comes to sooner and more rapids. , japan couple of persons off from the 1989 high that we have really been waiting for and now potentially, that is further complicated when it comes to the bank of japan side of things with the economy with that gdp number that came out earlier in the hour, showing that the economy has looked into a recession and the path to policy normalization may be a little bit more complicated going forward. we are also watching some of these movers in terms of so many, falling the most in a year after cutting the playstation 5 and the revenue outlook, as well. some risk drops not helping the

outlook to that, 7.8% lower after the company trimmed its revenue forecast and sales on the playstation 5 came in lower than expectations. also watching some of these other names and japan, including one of the outperformer's, rakuten on internet services, raising the profit forecast. this get more now on the unofficial indonesian election and let's get back there with our next guest. haslinda: the question is what the presidency would mean and how would policies look like with prabowo at the top. douglas ramage joins me here in japan. good to have you with us.

60% endorsement, what does it say? douglas: it is an extraordinary strong mandate. significantly outside of our forecast, but it is stabilizing. let's just get on with things is the strong sense. they wanted one round of continuity, and the business community is happy with that, so it is good for the business community and indonesians. haslinda: it was about ideology and people were debating fiercely, but not this time around. why not? douglas: what is so striking about it is the form of this community would have been just fine with any presidential candidate because the correct assumption was they were all supportive of the pragmatic moves that the administration made to include investment. nobody is saying that indonesia has another move to development, so in that sense, any move would have been justified. douglas: the focus -- haslinda: the focus would be on his cabinet and to the next

finance minister would be. how are you looking at it? pdip still leads and is still popular, so i think there will be a lot of pressure. douglas: i think that a president prabowo would have the same desire to bring as many of his potential foes into the cabinet as possible, the same decision made before as the minority president before when he could not get much done and he ended up with a fact cabinet, so bringing in as many players as possible. it is fundamentally stabilizing, and it also sets up expectations of central continuity in terms of overall policies. however, make no mistake, president prabowo would be his own president. he is not going to simply be a third term. haslinda: what douglas: douglas: does that mean? i think it means broader continuity in terms of emphasis and infrastructure. i think a significantly expanded emphasis on social wayfair and

human development and this will be extraordinary. there are promises of very ambitious and expensive projects he would like to implement to improve the nation welfare, and we will have to have a somewhat different fiscal approach to that. probably, we need -- indonesia will need a bit less obsessive focus on its 3% deficit limit that it has imposed, especially with the asian financial presses. haslinda: how do investors look at this? indonesia is important and significant because of the resources it has as one of the bigger exporters of everything from coal to nickel. and we see how a ban on nickel drove prices higher. what impact would prabowo have on that aspect of indonesia? douglas: specifically on the mineral mining and exports, i think it is now a goodman that all policy leaves, especially

those in president-elect prabowo 's team would be supportive of downstream policies. that you should not just dig up minerals and export them without adding value domestically. every member supports this position. why? because they look at the last five years and they see success, that there has been more incoming domestic investment focused on the downstream. investors do not necessarily always like it, but they have found a way to make it work. haslinda: how do you see prabowo navigating indonesia's relationship with the u.s. and china? some say that a prabowo win is a china win, and if you consider the possibility of trump coming back in power, how might that play out? douglas: i think under a president prabowo, my sense is it is not a win for china or anyone except him, his coalition, and hopefully indonesia. he would be immensely pragmatic. indonesia would like to have balance, and it is crucial with

their internal relationships, as well as international, so we can expect that. if anything, a president prabowo would be somewhat more skeptical towards geopolitical concerns in asia-pacific. his defense minister was responsible for the largest military exercises held on this oil since world war ii that involved american, australian and other so-called allied troops, so we can expect probably a warm relationship with the u.s. and continuing warm relationship with china, as well. haslinda: not to mention that prabowo bought a lot of u.s. tax. douglas: and canceled russian ones, is all. haslinda: thank you, douglas ramage, tower group asia indonesia -- bower group asia indonesia. well, we all await to see how that prabowo presidency would look for indonesia.

haidi: all the focus is really on what the next period of reform, the post era will look like. that was haslinda. we will continuing our coverage and the implications for investors, and speaking with the prabowo campaign team, as well as a former trade minister in the reaction from indonesia. former u.s. president donald trump is said to be considering scaled-back measures to nato members as see returns to re-task, also getting them around the negotiating table. derek wallbank joins us. we are starting to get an idea of what a trump foreign policy 2.0 would look like and a lot of the criticisms made of nato could be seen as fair. derek: yeah, i mean, there is a 2% of gdp spending target that nato allies have committed to that if i am being honest, many

of them do not meet, and it has been a source of concern. the u.s. puts up the bulk of the funding for nato generally speaking. i think a lot of countries you saw more around 1.4, 1.5%. that started to change after russia's initial invasion of crimea, and he started to see that take up. donald trump, during his presidency, made this threat, made a real big deal of the idea of getting people up to 2% and saying he would rethink. he saw a lot during the trump presidency about making big brand threats to spur action with potentially cataclysmic consequences. they usually was some resolution well short of that, although there were instances where he followed through with some of those threats launching a trade war with china being a great example of this, but this is sort of more of the same here. the alliance, overall, as they

say, has gotten more spending on the table, particularly on its eastern front. however, a lot of the allies on the western side of the alliance still are well short of those targets. i should also mention that trump's remarks on nato have been met with criticism by the biden campaign, which says that he is insufficiently committed to the nato alliance in ways that are helping vladimir putin and russia right now at this moment with the war in ukraine. paul: some very serious questions about a potential president trump's commitment to ukraine, talking about bringing an early conflict with russia. how does that come about? derek: i think you have got to read this in context of all of the remarks that donald trump has been saying about the conflict full stop.

democrats and some republicans want 60 plus billion dollars assistance to ukraine in terms of military aid, but that has been held up by republicans loyalty trump, who have been resisting on that, so trump is trying to figure out a way to preen this to a conclusion, but if you were to do that at that point, the counter argument goes that that would be doing so when ukraine would be more at a moment of weakness rather than a moment of strength, enable to push back more forcefully against russia, so there are some concerns there about how that does. also, sort of how you would get this together, as well. ukraine has said the conditions for victory are all of them glanced back, including some of the things russia took earlier in the last decade, which we are not particularly close to, or as

putin has his own objections and how do you get closer to the table? there are a lot of questions there, but for sure, the biggest question, if you were to get towards a pushing for talks, at what positions of relative strength do those talks come, and how does that actually get there? donald trump has said a lot of things. i think one of the bigger points i would make here, he said a lot of things, and you do start seeing the world taking him a little more seriously now that we are moving close to an election where polls say he is at worst a coin flip's chance away from returning to the presidency. paul: all right, derek wallbank there. we have plenty more to come on "daybreak: asia." stay with us. this is bloomberg. ♪

thanks to avalara, we can calculate sales tax automatically. avalarahhhhhh what if tax rates change? ahhhhhh filing sales tax returns? ahhhhhh business license guidance? ahhhhhh -cross-border sales? -ahhhhhh -item classification? -ahhhhhh does it connect with acc...? ahhhhhh ahhhhhh ahhhhhh hey, brent! if you had to choose, would you watch paint dry or compare benefits plans? compare benefits. gusto makes it easier to find the right plan for my team. i think i'm going to need new glasses. no problem. you're covered. choose benefits without the mess.

paul: japan's economy has unexpectedly contracted for a second straight quarter, so we have a technical recession which leads to the boj ending its negative rates policy. let's get to paul jackson in tokyo. that was not in the script, what is the path for boj? paul j.: [laughter]

that is right, this is not the result anybody wanted, this is the perfect headache for the boj. after all, this carefully correlated to build this first rate interest hike -- interest rate hike since 2007, and just as expected, the green light to say go, it stays red, and not only that, it is worse. just think about this. we have 34 economists looking at the forecasts for gdp, and only one said there was a chance of contraction. quite a few around zero, but only securities called a contraction, so which central bank of the world would like to raise interest rates when the economy is in contraction and recession? it is not a good look, so the optics are not great, but i would caution against this

means, ok, no rate hike until the summer, until we have a quarter of growth. i think we are still on track, but business does complicate -- but this does complicate the picture, and if you look at the figures coming out, we will see the probability that market traders have for rate hike by april has dropped to 63%, so keep an eye on how expectations change, but, certainly, i think the boj is going to have to do a lot of explaining if it would like to carry on with its rate hike with an economy in recession. haidi: is there some angst with dollar strength and yen weakness? does that complicate the outlook? it is an easy way to give support to the end if they move sooner. paul j.: if they move sooner, that does help the yen, but you have been doing this incredible

monetary stimulus project for more than a decade. do you really want to be looking as if you are responding to some yen moves at the last minute? it looks like a knee-jerk reaction at the wrong time, so i think the optics don't look good for that, and, don't forget, weekend does help and that is the only thing that was good and the results today. consumption is down, businesses are spending less, and it is for three straight quarters, does that look like a positive growth cycle to you? it is not to me. haidi: at least the markets are still going gangbusters, thank you. that was paul jackson there in tokyo, talking about those surprising gdp numbers, a recession for japan. morehead on "daybreak: asia." this is bloomberg. ♪

haidi: gains amid the broader market rally with the potential side of upside for chinese equities. a good review of the market open in hong kong. you would be very optimistic to be pinning your hopes on

following through, translating into any permanent boost of sentiment here. charlotte: so the real sure begin last week when they began trading. for hong kong, traders are trying to look at how we got so far after the first new days of new year, and today, we are watching closely, watching the hotel stocks, with chinese estate media, as cctv reported some gross more than 60%, and we are also watching airline stocks , with airline travel showing a stronger recovery momentum, so the consumption stocks we are closely walking and that is true of today's trading. paul a.: foreign investors are very cool on chinese assets at

the moment. can you give us a sense of what the short interest is looking like? charlotte: so, all of the financial products provided have a change in appetite for chinese equities, and we saw just last week, there was a focus on emerging markets that exclude china, and this comes as last year the top selling etf is one that is in measured markets that includes china, so a lot of investors at the moment are choosing to invest in the yen, but excluding china's position, and at the moment, they have gone defensive, and going after those more dividend focused stocks at the moment, until they see more fiscal policies and support in the real estate sector, as well as we see other supports we could come from securities regulators, so a lot

of investors are watching at this stage. paul a.: charlotte anger there. -- charlotte yang there. let's look at the stocks we are watching when markets do open in hong kong, tech stocks after gains in hong kong, on the markets return yesterday for the lunar new year holiday, many listed shares and focused after analyst estimates were beat and boosted by strong insurance sales in hong kong and canada, and ping insurance was cut to sell. haidi: kind of a shock with the numbers out of australia, when we see that reaction in the slide and yields here in australia. we saw hiring inching up but unemployment climbing to that two year high, so little bit of a signal of prompting vets of

the earliest interest rate cut. we also saw declines in the aussie dollar, stock traders bringing foreign rights to that first rate cut from september to november. bonds exciting after the data came out, extending the opening call down nine basis points, bond futures for the three-year jumping over 10 basis points. 10-year yield falling about nine basis points, as well. the aussie dollar holding pretty steady at this point, around 64 level. we saw the rba last week holding it at the 12 year high, and perhaps it is this week that easing will come sooner rather than later. this is bloomberg. ♪

♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪