Economic calendar: US retail sales in the limelight

Summary:

• US retail sales for November to be the first important release after the last Fed’s meeting this year
• Final inflation readings for November from Spain and Poland Some
• ECB and Fed speakers on the agenda

8:00 am GMT - CPI from Spain for November (final): It’s going to be the final print hence its impact on the euro should be limited. At the same time, the ECB does not foresee to strike the price objective until 2022, as evidenced by the updated staff macroeconomic projections released on Thursday. That means a bar for any rate hike by that time is set really high.

9:00 am GMT - CPI from Poland for November (final): The consensus suggests headline inflation should stay at 2.6% YoY (unchanged compared to the initial release), but we see a possibility for an uptick to 2.7% YoY. Looking forward, price growth in the Polish economy is forecast to rise in the months to come, in party due to unfreezing electricity prices in 2020. For that reason the annual rate of headline inflation could close to 3.5% in the first three months of the next year but then it’s expected to gradually decline and back to the MPC’s goal of 2.5%.

1:30 pm GMT - Retail sales from the US for November: It’s going to be the first important economic release after the Federal Reserve meeting. Expectations seem to be quite positive with headline sales anticipated to have bounced 0.5% MoM and ex-auto sales to have increased 0.4% MoM, if realized both would be much better than previously. On the other hand, given the fact that the Fed does not forecast a significant slowdown for 2020 any much worse-than-expected reading could build some downside risks to this projection. 

Central bankers’ speeches:

• 8:00 am GMT - ECB’s de Guindos

• 8:30 am GMT - ECB’s Villeroy

• 10:00 am GMT - ECB’s Holzmann

• 4:00 pm GMT - Fed’s Williams