{"text":[[{"start":11.64,"text":"Next week will be capped off by a flurry of US labour market data set to land just as simmering inflation and signs of economic overheating are combining to push Treasury yields to multi-decade highs."}],[{"start":24.087,"text":"Thirty-year US Treasury yields, which are driven by rising inflation expectations, surged this week to their highest level since June 2004 after a report published on Wednesday showed business activity accelerated in September at the fastest pace in five years."}],[{"start":39.8,"text":"The 10-year Treasury yield, which sets borrowing costs across the globe, rose to its highest since 2007 as remarks by Federal Reserve policymakers added to concerns that higher interest rates will be required to cool the US economy."}],[{"start":54.12,"text":"The Fed last month raised rates for the first time since 2023 — by a quarter point to a range of 3.75 per cent to 4 per cent — with new chair Kevin Warsh using his press conference to flag the strength of the economy and the labour market."}],[{"start":69.08,"text":"Data to be released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics on Friday is expected to show the US added 100,000 jobs in September, which would mark a slowdown from the 162,000 new jobs added in August."}],[{"start":82.02,"text":"Economists polled by Reuters expect the data also to show that the US unemployment rate rose to 4.2 per cent in September from 4.1 per cent in August."}],[{"start":91.9,"text":"Bank of America strategists are forecasting just 60,000 new jobs and the unemployment rate to hold steady at 4.1 per cent, which they said would ease pressure on the Fed to raise rates again in October. George Steer"}],[{"start":104.86,"text":"How big an inflation problem is the ECB facing?"}],[{"start":109.48,"text":"With natural gas prices having shot up to their highest level since late 2022 and oil prices hovering above $100 a barrel, euro area inflation is widely expected to have got another shot in the arm in September, strengthening the case for a third interest rate rise by the European Central Bank."}],[{"start":126.8,"text":"Economists polled by Reuters expect consumer prices in September to have risen by 3.5 per cent year on year, up from 3.2 per cent in August, the fastest pace in close to three years, when Eurostat publishes its flash estimate on Friday."}],[{"start":141.46,"text":"That would leave inflation above the ECB’s medium-term target of 2 per cent for the seventh month in a row. Analysts are also bracing for higher core inflation, which excludes volatile energy and food prices and is forecast to have risen to 2.6 per cent, a level briefly seen in May."}],[{"start":159.7,"text":"The central bank raised interest rates this month to 2.5 per cent, and markets are pricing in a nearly 50 per cent chance of another rise next month, with one rise fully priced in and a 30 per cent chance of a second by the end of the year."}],[{"start":174.3,"text":"“This uptick [in inflation] is not primarily due to the transmission of higher energy costs,” Morgan Stanley economists wrote in a note to clients on Friday, adding that it partly reflects volatility in tourism. Airfares and accommodation costs softened in August and are likely to rebound in September, they said."}],[{"start":193.38,"text":"Energy prices are likely to have risen “steeply” by an annual pace of close to 18 per cent, after a 14 per cent rise in August, Morgan Stanley added. But despite such eye-watering numbers, inflation trends so far seem to be in line with the ECB’s baseline scenario."}],[{"start":210.64,"text":"“This would support our conviction that the next ECB move will come in December, and not October,” the analysts said. Olaf Storbeck"}],[{"start":219.5,"text":"Will Japanese businesses benefit from higher interest rates?"}],[{"start":222.9,"text":"The Bank of Japan’s quarterly Tankan survey of business sentiment on Thursday will provide a snapshot of the economy at a particularly turbulent time, as companies relish the greater pricing power they have gained with the end of deflation but face fragile consumer confidence as inflation starts to bite."}],[{"start":239.9,"text":"The BoJ has raised interest rates to their highest level in 31 years but the yen remains persistently weak and seemingly resistant to attempts by the government to talk or manipulate it higher."}],[{"start":251.34,"text":"Companies’ responses to the survey were taken around September 9 — before the BoJ’s interest rate decision but at a time when a 0.25 percentage point rise was deemed a virtual certainty."}],[{"start":262.7,"text":"Analysts expect the sentiment of large manufacturers to have improved in the most recent quarter, while that of non-manufacturers is likely to have dropped modestly while remaining high."}],[{"start":272.82,"text":"Analysts at Morgan Stanley MUFG said they would focus on any signals of the early impact of the BoJ’s tightening — such as improvement in capital expenditure plans among small and medium-sized non-manufacturers, which were revised down unusually sharply in the June Tankan survey. Leo Lewis"}],[{"start":296.7,"text":""}]],"url":"https://audio.ftcn.net.cn/album/a_1790562645_1690.mp3"}