With China the most important country in the world right now IMO, April
China PMI rose to 53.5 from 52.4 and is at the highest level since May
’08. This data point reflects economic activity among state owned
businesses and is different than the CLSA mfr’g PMI that comes out next
week that is private sector weighted and is still below 50, at 44.8 in
March. April UK PMI joined the less bad crowd, rising to 42.9 from 39.5
in March and vs expectations of 40. It’s at the highest level since Aug
’08. US$ 3 mo LIBOR has fallen for the 24th straight day and is now less
than 1 bp from 1%. The release of the results of the Treasury stress
test that was scheduled to be released on Monday may now be postponed
until the latter part of the week as the pupils argue with the teacher
over some of the conclusions and all parties can better prepare for the
aftermath of the results both in terms of capital raising and business
and customer perception.
