ECB Vice President: The Eurozone economy will fall into a downturn again...

Overview of the global market

Ahead of the blockbuster CPI release, the S&P rebounded to a two-year high. The yield on the 10-year Treasury note recovered slightly to 4.0%. The U.S. dollar index retreated, and the offshore yuan fell more than 100 points intraday, falling to 7.19 for the first time in four weeks.

U.S. oil inventories rose more than expected, and crude oil erased more than 1% of intraday gains and turned down, closing down at least 1%. U.S. natural gas stopped six consecutive days, falling from a nearly two-month high.

Global news

1. Pour cold water on interest rate cuts? ECB Vice President: The eurozone economy will fall into a downturn again

ECB Vice President De Guindos believes that the eurozone economy will shrink in the fourth quarter, and two consecutive quarters of economic contraction mean a technical recession, and the economic outlook is weak in the near future. Another ECB official, Isabel Schnabel, a member of the central bank's executive board, said that the near-term economic outlook remains weak, in line with the central bank's forecast. Both reiterated that the ECB's decision is data-dependent.

2. U.S. mortgage applications for home purchases rose the most since June last year

U.S. mortgage applications rose last week by the most since June, as borrowing costs hovered near seven-month lows. The Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) benchmark for mortgage home purchases rose 5.6% in the week ended Jan. 5. The overall index of MBA mortgage applications, which includes home purchases and refinancing, rose 9.9%, the biggest increase in nearly a year.

3. India has stepped up its crackdown on offshore crypto trading venues such as Binance

India has stepped up its crackdown on offshore crypto exchanges that are not registered locally, requiring Apple to remove platform apps, including Binance, from its Indian app store. It is reported that 8 exchange apps, including Bitfinex, HTX, and Kucoin, are no longer available on the Indian app store.

4. EIA: U.S. natural gas prices will be below $3.00 per MMBtu in 2025

The latest report from the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) predicts that the annual average spot price of natural gas at the Henry Hub in the U.S. natural gas trading hub will be below $3.00 per MMBtu in 2024 and 2025. With record natural gas production and inventories above the 2019-2023 average, natural gas prices in 2025 will be less than half of the 2022 highs.

5. South Korea's unemployment rate rose to 3.3%, a two-year high

Statistics Korea said on Wednesday that the seasonally adjusted unemployment rate rose to 3.3 percent in December from 2.8 percent in the previous month. Economists had forecast a rise of just 0.1 percentage points, and the central bank was widely expected to keep borrowing costs at their highest level in more than 15 years.

6. Zheng Shajie, director of the National Development and Reform Commission, presided over the symposium and continued to communicate with private enterprises on a regular basis

Zheng Shajie said that in the next step, the National Development and Reform Commission will carefully sort out the opinions and suggestions of the participating entrepreneurs, establish a mechanism for cross-regional and cross-departmental coordination and problem solving, based on the overall situation, draw inferences from one case, and work with relevant departments to increase the protection of the property rights of private enterprises and the rights and interests of entrepreneurs in accordance with the law.

7. More than 30% of urban 30-year-olds are unmarried

According to the sample size calculation of "marital status of the population aged 15 and above in cities across the country by age and gender" in the second part of the "Chinese Population and Employment Statistics Yearbook 2023" - 2022 population change sample survey data, it is found that in 2022, the unmarried rate of the 25-29 age group in mainland cities will be 56.9%, and the unmarried rate of the 30-34 age group will reach 20%.

8. The "GDP trillion club" has been expanded to 25 cities: Changzhou has become the newest player

In 2023, Changzhou will enter the ranks of "trillion cities". This means that after Dongguan's GDP exceeded one trillion yuan in 2021, the country's "trillion city club" will expand again, and Jiangsu will also usher in the fifth "trillion city".

Industry information

1. Amazon's worst layoffs in history have expanded again: the media and game live streaming division laid off hundreds of people in the New Year

According to media reports, the livestreaming platform Twitch will lay off another 35% of its workforce, involving about 500 employees. Despite being backed by Amazon's infrastructure, Twitch's operating costs are still prohibitively high, which is why Twitch has decided to stop operating in South Korea, according to company executives. In 2023, Twitch has already seen two rounds of layoffs totaling 400 people, and several executives have left. Nine years after being acquired by Amazon, Twitch is still unprofitable, according to people familiar with the matter.

2. There are five more lowering of the first home loan interest rate, and most of the 70 cities have entered the "3 era"

Since the beginning of this year, many cities across the country have lowered the interest rate of the first home loan in stages. Among the 70 large and medium-sized cities in the country, more than seventy percent of the cities have reached the lower limit of the first commercial personal housing loan interest rate to the "3 prefix", and the first home loan interest rate in most cities has hit a record low.

3. In 2024, the property market transactions in key cities will open at a low level!

According to the Zhuge Data Research Center, the transaction situation of key cities in the first week of 2024 was released. According to the data, in the first week of this year (1.1-1.7), the transaction of new houses in key cities monitored decreased by 51.88% month-on-month, and the transaction of second-hand residential buildings decreased by 26.72% month-on-month. During this period, the sentiment index of the key 50 cities was -0.8, stepping on the market downturn.

4. In December last year, domestic excavator sales increased year-on-year for the first time in the year

According to data released by the China Construction Machinery Industry Association, the main excavator manufacturers in statistics sold 16,700 excavators of various types in December 2023, a year-on-year decrease of 1.01%. Among them, domestic sales were 7,625 units, a year-on-year increase of 24%, the first year-on-year increase last year.

5. Teachers are no longer "iron rice bowls", and many places have implemented a withdrawal mechanism for primary and secondary school teachers

Recently, the 2024 work meeting of the Education Development Council of Fengtai District, Beijing was held, and the "Several Measures to Promote the Management Reform of Primary and Secondary School Teachers in Fengtai District" was interpreted at the meeting, and it was proposed that in 2024, the district will strengthen the annual assessment of teachers and the use of assessment results, and explore the establishment of a teacher exit mechanism. According to incomplete statistics, Beijing Municipality, Ningbo City in Zhejiang Province, Guiyang City in Guizhou Province, Pingyin County in Shandong Province and other places have begun to pilot the withdrawal mechanism of teachers, and there are certain differences in the withdrawal mechanism in various places.

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