Warrants Highlight

China - Focus of Announcements this Week

After a big week of macro announcements, major economies are taking a break from economic releases. With the exception of China, the United States and Europe (save the publication of ECB’s monthly report for August) do not have any significant data published this week.

Important figures from China
Shut for National Day this Thursday, the Singapore market will miss out trading on a day China releases its July Consumer Price Index and Industrial Production figures. Analysts polled by the Bloomberg estimates that inflation will probably slow to 1.7% in July compared to the 2.2% in June.

Singapore will however, re-open to China’s export numbers for July, which consensus believe will also see a slow-down from the 11.3% export figure in June to a 8% figure in July. The Chinese government has a goal of 10 percent growth in trade this year, but looks at risk of missing it.

In mid-July, China’s Premier Wen Jiabao had warned that the momentum for a recovery in economic growth isn’t yet in place and that “difficulties” may persist for a while after data showed that China had the weakest expansion in three years. The Premier then added that authorities will thus intensify fine-tuning of policies to address this.

Macquarie has warrants listed over the FTSE China A50 Index for investors keen to gain an exposure to the Chinese market:

Separately, Macquarie has listed the following new warrants this morning:

Singapore Market Wrap

China's trading fee reduction overshadows Europe's woes

On Friday, China announced their non-manufacturing PMI data. Non-maufacturing PMI fell from 56.7 in June to 55.6 in July. This raised concerns that the slowdown in China's exports and industrial production might be spreading to their services industry. Coupled with disappointment from the ECB and Fed, most Asian indices fell on Friday.

However, the Shanghai index ended more than 1% up on Friday, shrugging off the lousy PMI data as investors found reasons to be happy with a reduction in trading fees. The HSI closed lower on Friday while the STI added gains day on day.

The STI closed at 3051.33, up 1.8% wow while the HSI closed at 19666.18, up 2% wow.

Call STI 2950MBeCW120831 (QE8W) exercise level 2,950.*
Put STI 2850MBePW120831 (QE9W) exercise level 2,850.*

HSI20200MBeCW120830 (QS5W) exercise level 20,200.*
HSI19800MBePW120830 (QS7W) exercise level 19,800.*

Strong income for DBS
DBS released their quarterly corporate earnings a day after OCBC announced theirs. Before Singapore's equity markets opened, DBS announced record half-year net profits of S$1.74bil, up 13% from the same period in 2011. It was noteworthy that total income crossed S$4bil for the first time ever.

DBS CEO Piyush Gupta was proud of the bank's performance despite "a difficult operating environment, characterised by the global macroeconomic slowdown and volatile markets". He also added that he believes that DBS "has what it takes to become a leading Asian bank". DBS Chairman Peter Seah reaffirmed Gupta's belief in the bank and also reassured investors that they are "committed to pursuing the Danamon transaction".

DBS closed at $14.75 on Friday, up 0.7% wow.

Call warrant DBS MB eCW121101 (QZ1W) exercise price $15.00.*
Call warrant DBS MB eCW121102 (Q0NW) exercise price $14.00.*
Call warrant DBS MB eCW130103 (K8KW) exercise price $16.00.*
Put warrant DBS MB ePW121018 (Q3LW) exercise price $14.00.*

Turnover in derivatives and commodities grew in Singapore
On Friday, the SGX announced that securities turnover fell year-on-year (yoy) while derivatives and commodities volume grew. Although securities turnover fell 9% yoy, in contrast, both the derivatives and SICOM rubber futures volume expanded 12% yoy.

Investors deemed this to be positive for SGX and the counter closed at $6.69 on Friday, up 0.6% wow.

Call warrant SGX MB eCW121204 (Q0PW) exercise price $6.50.*
Call warrant SGX MB eCW121203 (Q0LW) exercise price $7.50.*
Put warrant SGX MB ePW121203 (Q0BW) exercise price $ 6.00.*

Overnight Market Wrap

Finally a ray of light

After consecutive letdowns from the Fed and the ECB, investors finally found a reason to celebrate with better-than-expected jobs data though unemployment rates show no improvements.

Change in non-farm employment came in at 163000, exceeding the Bloomberg survey of 100000. Since the Fed announced that they were going to put off easing for the time being and the ECB failing to come up with concrete plans to help the crisis in Europe, the S&P had fallen 1.5%. However, following the non-farm payroll data, the S&P erased losses and added 1.9% on Friday ending positive for the week. The S&P closed at 1390.99 on Friday.

Overnight Markets

Indices	Last	Change
STI	3051.33	0.5%
HSI	19666.18	-0.1%
DJIA	13096.17	1.7%
S&P 500	1390.99	1.9%
Nasdaq	2967.90	2.0%
China A50	7511.46	0.3%

Corporate News 

Corporate Announcements

Results announcements:
Tue 7 Aug: UOB 2Q12, Ezion 2Q12
Mon 13 Aug: Noble 2Q12
Tue 14 Aug: IndoFood Agri 2Q12, Wilmar 2Q12, Singtel 1Q13, STX OSV 2Q12
Tue 28 Aug: Olam 4Q12

Ex-dividend dates:
Mon 6 Aug: SingTel ($0.09)
Wed 8 Aug: OCBC ($0.16)
Wed 15 Aug: DBS ($0.28), SembMarine ($0.05)
Thu 30 Aug: Sakari ($0.02)
Wed 26 Sep: SGX ($0.15)