For the week starting March 7th and ending March 11th, 2016

  1. ECB Interest Rate decision (Thursday, March 10, 7:45 AM ET/1245 GMT). The ECB meets on Thursday and there is expectations of further action from the ECB especially since the inflation data was weaker than expectations. Does it come in the form of a cut in rates, an increase in the QE, a change in the term for QE? We don't know. That last move in December saw the ECB disappoint the market by cutting the deposit facility rate by 0.1% to -0.3%, they extended QE by 6 months to March 2017 and said they would reinvest maturing proceeds in new debt. The market was disappointed that it kept the QE at 60 billion. The EURUSD on that day surged from a low of 1.0518 to a high of 1.0980. The price right now??? 1.0994 - 14 pips off of that high level on that day. The decision will be announced at 7:45 AM ET/1245 GMT while Draghi will hold his press conference at 8:30 AM ET/1330 GMT
  2. Bank of Canada interest rate statement (Wednesday, March 9, 10 AM ET/1500 GMT). The Bank of Canada are likely to keep rates unchanged at 0.5%. The housing market remains a problem as home prices in Vancouver has risen 22% and 15% in Toronto over the last year. The currency has risen 9.4% since the peak in January at 1.4689, and has come reached the midpoint of the move up from the 2015 low (at 1.3304), but any thought of a cut to weaken the currency and stimulate exports, might just fuel the housing boom even more. In addition, prospects from higher oil prices and hopes that the US economy survives the anxiety of a rough start to the year are worth sitting tight.
  3. RBNZ rate decision/Statement (Wednesday in US/Thursday in New Zealand): The Reserve Bank of New Zealand is expected to keep rates unchanged at 2.5% but may be more dovish in their statement due to global uncertainties, low inflation. The NZD is off its lows too. Good news is the recent dairy price auction was 1.4% higher. Like in Canada housing remains too strong as well. In the last statement the RBNZ said that "some further policy easing may be required over coming year to ensure that future inflation settles near the middle of the target range"
  4. FOMC Fischer to speak (Monday, March 7th at 1 PM ET/1800 GMT). Although the title of the speech is "Reflections on Macroeconomics Then and Now", there is always a potential for comments on the economy by the Vice Chair. The Feds decision is on March 16th (meeting starts on March 15th), so this will be one of the last opportunites to hear from a Fed official before the 7-day blackout period. Fed's Brainard wiil also speak on Monday at 1 PM. The title of her speech is "Economic Outlook, Liquidity and Resilience"
  5. China Trade (Tuesday Tentative). The China trade balance will be released on March 8th (tentative) The expectation is for $50.75B surplus vs $63.29 last month. Exports are expected to fall -15% and imports are also expected to fall by -10.2%. In CNY terms the surplus is expected at 328.95B according to Bloomberg. CPI will also be released next week with expectations for CPI to increase by 1.8%

5b. Canada employment (Friday, 8:30 AM ET/1330 GMT). The employment change is expected to increase by 10.2K vs -5.7k last month, while the unemployment rate is expected to remain steady at 7.2%.