Australian shares are expected to open weaker on Monday, after finishing at a record last week. The S&P/ASX 200 has broken intraday records six times this year.
Already a subscriber?Hopes that central banks will lower interest rates as global inflation uniformly slows are bolstering investor appetite for growth stocks, sending world equity benchmarks to new highs despite a pause for the bull market on Friday.
The US unemployment rate rose to 3.9 per cent in February, from 3.7 per cent for the past three straight months, and wage growth slowed to 0.1 per cent. The mixed result kept alive hopes of Federal Reserve rate cuts this year.“We read this labour data as pointing to a healthy and robust market, but not one that is running away and risks generating substantial upward pressure on prices,” said Christian Keller, head of economics research at Barclays.
The US consumer price index and retail sales data due this week may offer more clues on the likely timing of Fed policy.Barclays forecasts CPI to accelerate to 0.5 per cent in February from 0.3 per cent in January due to higher energy prices, and the core measure to have cooled to 0.3 per cent, from 0.4 per cent.
Unexpectedly strong jobs and inflation reports in January stoked worries that inflation could re-accelerate, pushing back the timing of Fed rate cuts.
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