Morning wrap (17.11.2023)

• Governor Ueda of the BoJ began his testimony in Japan's parliament. The banker said he would maintain a loose monetary policy, and that a "weak" yen is beneficial to Japan in many ways. Ueda concluded that the YCC curve control program will end if the BoJ is confident that inflation will reach its target level. 
• In their first meeting of the year, Chinese President Xi Jinping and Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida pledged to continue their relationship, which media reports said could be a sign that Asia's two largest economies want to repair their strained relations.
• Stock market indices in the Asia-Pacific region were trading at mixed levels, mimicking the tone of yesterday's session on Wall Street. Korea's KOSPI lost nearly 0.85% intraday, while Japan's Nikkei was down 0.15%. The Hang Seng is doing very poorly at the moment, rubbing nearly 2% off on a daily basis. 
• European futures point to a higher opening in today's cash session.
• Volatility in the FX market is somewhat limited at this point. Relative to other currencies, the New Zealand dollar is currently performing poorly. Slightly better sentiment is seen on the Canadian dollar and the Japanese yen, among others.
• Treasury bond yields remain at low levels during the early hours of this week's final session in Europe. US 10-year notes are settling near the 4.44% zone after yesterday's decline. 
• After yesterday's huge sell-off in the oil market, today's crude price momentum is somewhat subdued. On an intraday basis during European morning trading, Brent crude loses 0.08%, while WTI oil adds 0.3%. Natural gas is doing much better, gaining 1.5%.
• Bitcoin gains 0.4% intraday and remains above the $36,000 barrier. Much better sentiment, however, is seen on altcoins, which are posting higher gains. Dogecoin is gaining more than 4%, while Avalanche is up more than 6%. Ethereum gains 0.7% and is trading above $1985 level.
• Precious metals are trading slightly higher, with gold gaining 0.16% and silver adding 0.35%.
• On Friday's macro calendar, we can find, among others: the UK retail sales report, final CPI data from the Eurozone, data on US housing starts and speeches by numerous central bankers. 

Heatmap of the FX market, which illustrates the volatility on individual currency pairs at the moment. Source: xStation 5