A look at the day ahead in European and global markets from Tom Westbrook
In Beijing's biggest wholesale food market the butcher blocks are quiet. The lead up to the Lunar New Year should be the busiest season, but pensive consumers are holding back.
Thursday's China price data reflects their reticence. Food prices were the major drag pushing consumer prices down 0.8% on an annual basis for January, the biggest decline since 2009.
The butchers of Beijing were downcast and well may be investors -- if consumers are cutting back on something as age old as pork over the festivities, what are they substituting?
What else are they cutting back on? China's stock markets went into the week-long break with a whimper, though at least off five-year lows broached earlier in the week.
The Shanghai Composite's more than 4% gain for the shortened week is set to be its largest since Nov. 2022. Investors have taken leadership change at the top of China's market regulator as another sign that authorities are taking note of the pain.
Few, however, see market measures as the way out of the economic malaise - or the drag on confidence from falling prices and the property crisis - that has shares in such a funk. Deepening fall in producer prices are an ill omen for the year ahead - that squeezes profit margins, presaging cost cutting, wage restraint and a feedback loop into more consumer caution.
Alibaba (NYSE:BABA) shares fell 6.8% in Hong Kong as revenue missed estimates.
Elsewhere, Japanese markets strode back toward three-decade highs led by a 10% gain for Softbank (OTC:SFTBY) thanks to strong earnings at chipmaker Arm where it is majority owner.
Central banker appearances and earnings headline the calendar in the day ahead. Richmond Fed President Thomas Barkin appears on TV at 1330 GMT. Bank of England's Catherine Mann delivers a speech on inflation at 1500 GMT and European Central Bank economist Philip Lane speaks in Washington at 1530 GMT.
French bank Societe Generale (OTC:SCGLY) is due to report earnings, having announced earlier in the week it plans to cut about 900 jobs at its Paris headquarters. Unilever (LON:ULVR) will offer a real-time view on consumers' habits.
Key developments that could influence markets on Thursday:
Earnings: AstraZeneca (NASDAQ:AZN), Credit Agricole (OTC:CRARY), British American Tobacco (NYSE:BTI), Siemens, SocGen, Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield, Unilever
Speeches: Fed's Barkin, ECB's Elderson, Wunsch and Lane, BoE's Mann