Today’s Outlook:
• The Dow Jones Industrial Average led the gainers by rising 163 points/+0.5% on Wednesday (15.11.23) after US Inflation data proved to be sluggish and was triggered by a rally in Retail sector stocks. Inflation at the producer level also slowed to a growth rate of 1.3% yoy in Oct, versus 2.2% in Sept, lower than the 1.9% forecast. This PPI release showed the biggest price decline at the producer level in 3.5 years on the back of cheaper oil prices, a day after US CPI (Oct) was also reported to have flattened lower than expected. Another report that added to the optimism that the Fed will eventually cut interest rates early next year was Retail Sales (Oct) dropping 0.1% mom, the first fall in 7 months, which beat expectations of minus 0.3%, and contrasted with the previous month’s growth of positive 0.9%. Market participants are also watching the outcome of the first meeting in a year between US President Joe Biden and Chinese leader Xi Jinping on Wednesday, hoping that the meeting will ease the dispute between the two superpowers on military conflicts, drug trafficking, and artificial intelligence (AI). Another positive catalyst was the US House of Representatives passing a temporary spending bill that would avert a government shutdown, with broad support from lawmakers from both parties. Today, as usual, the Initial Jobless Claims figure will be monitored, in which it is predicted that there will be 220k new weekly jobless claims, up from the previous week’s 217k.
• EUROPEAN MARKETS: Speaking of Inflation, the UK reported CPI (Oct) that also managed to cool down to 4.6% yoy, lower than the forecast of 4.8% and certainly from the previous month’s 6.7%. Following the data, their Input & Output PPI also fell from the September reading. The aura of economic slowdown was also felt in the Eurozone where they announced Industrial Production (Sept) which grew negative 6.9% yoy, greater than the estimate of – 6.3% and from the previous month. However, Eurozone Trade Balance (Sept) was a surplus of EUR 10bn, higher than the previous month’s EUR 5.9bn.
• ASIA MARKETS: Good news came from China yesterday, as both Industrial Production (Oct) and Retail Sales (Oct) came in stronger than expected. INDONESIA also got bullish sentiment from the release of Trade Balance surplus in October, worth USD 3.48bn, bigger than expected and previous month, supported by better Export & Import, so even though the growth is negative, the pace of decline has slowed down from the previous month. Japan was in the spotlight this morning as they published higher than expected Export growth but Imports dropped slightly lower than expected, resulting in a Trade Balance (Oct) deficit of JPY 662.5bn, leaving the previous month’s surplus at JPY 72.1bn.
• COMMODITIES: Energy stocks were dragged down by weaker Oil prices following the much higher-than-expected US Oil stockpile build at 3.6m barrels (versus forecast of 1.8m barrels) following the previous period’s increase of 13.8m barrels. Thus, the US has a record Oil production of 421.9m barrels. The oil prices benchmark, Brent and WTI, fell 1.6% and -2% respectively. The release of the above data follows the US government’s weekly report, which previously could not be published due to system upgrade issues, claiming that US Oil production held a record position of 13.2mn barrels/day in October. The largest Oil exporters, such as Saudi Arabia and Russia, who are members of OPEC+ reiterated this month that they will continue voluntary production cuts until the end of the year.
• JCI: the long awaited breakout finally came, JCI was able to perch steadily above the 6950 level for the first time since early Oct, thereby paving the way for further strengthening towards the year-end TARGET of 7150 (conservative). NHKSI RESEARCH suggests investors/traders are advised to Average Up gradually while watching the current Support area around 6900.

Company News
• PGAS : Reshuffle the Board of Directors and Commissioners
• MEDC : Secured Loan from Subsidiary
• FILM : Net Profit Plunged 43.7% YoY

Domestic & Global News
• Indonesia’s Economy Could Be Threatened by Pro-Israel Product Boycotts
• US President Joe Biden Seeks Better Relations to Help China’s Economy

Download full report HERE.