EUR/USD in focus after US CPI as ECB decision takes centre stage

Asian equity markets

Asian equity markets mostly rose on Thursday. As expected, the unemployment rate in Australia remained at 3.7% in August, with employment rising by 64,900, beating the forecast of 23,000 job creations. Yet, market Commentators can't see a case for a change in the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) outlook and still think the tightening campaign might be over.

The increase in employment is almost exclusively due to a rise in part-time employment of 62,100, which takes the number of part-time employees to 4.26 million, a record high.

The European equity market

There is no real direction on the European equity markets ahead of the European Central Banks (ECB) rate. For more than a year, there has been a broad consensus among the eurozone's monetary policymakers that interest rates need to go higher in order to tame inflation. Rates have been pushed from flat to 4.25% since July 2022.

But with signs of an impending eurozone recession becoming harder to ignore and annual price growth now at half its 10.6 percent peak, the unity over the direction of travel is fraying.

US retail sales

Over in the US, more statistics are due, all at 1.30 p.m.The producer price index is expected to rise by 0.4% in August month-over-month (MOM). Retail sales are also forecast to increase by 0.2% MoM. And initial jobless claims are expected at 225,000 for last week, up from the 215,000 recorded the previous week but still below the four-week average.

Arm

Arm, the chip design firm that supplies core technology to companies including Apple and Nvidia, has priced its initial public offering at $51 a share. The offering is at the top of Arm's expected price range of $47 to $51.

Softbank

The company will start trading today under the symbol "ARM." Provided that the 95.5 million shares are sold, this would raise $4.87 billion for Softbank. Is that a good deal for SoftBank? Valuation at $54 billion is $10 billion lower than ARM's valuation when Softbank bought the 25% it did not already own. But it is $14 billion higher than the price it agreed with NVIDIA before the transaction was aborted.

Adobe shares

Tonight, after the US closing bell, Adobe is forecast to post earnings of $3.97 per share, which would be a 17% increase on the same quarter a year ago. Revenue is seen rising 10% year-over-year (YoY) to $4.87 billion. Adobe shares are doing well. The stock posted a new 52-week high on Tuesday and has gained nearly 37% in the past 12 months.