Economic Calendar | August 21 – 25

Monday, August 21 

The beginning of a new trading week, as it usually happens, is accompanied by an absolutely empty macroeconomic calendar. But not only Monday will be relatively calm. By and large, no serious macroeconomic data is published throughout the trading week. 

Tuesday, August 22

Tuesday will be as boring a day as Monday, because the macroeconomic calendar is empty again. Attention can only be attracted by data on home sales in the secondary market of the United States. 

Wednesday, August 23

The only thing you can pay attention to on Wednesday is the preliminary estimates of business activity indices for key countries. So, in Japan, a purely symbolic decline in indices is expected with an extremely insignificant increase in the production index. This will not affect the yen in any way due to extremely small changes. 

In the eurozone, a slightly more noticeable decline is predicted, with all indices without exception, which is likely to lead to a purely symbolic weakening of the single European currency. 

At the same time, the pound may grow slightly, since in the UK, on the contrary, a slight increase in business activity indices is expected. 

But similar data for the United States are likely to be ignored, since the decline in the index of business activity in the service sector will be offset by the growth of the manufacturing index. As a result, the composite index should remain unchanged.

Thursday, August 24

With the exception of applications for unemployment benefits and orders for durable goods in the United States, the macroeconomic calendar on Thursday is again completely empty. Moreover, the market has been essentially ignoring this data for quite a long time. 

However, the summit in Jackson Hole begins on Thursday, which will last until Saturday inclusive. This is exactly what is the main event of the week. Most of all, Jerome Powell is expected to speak, who is likely to be asked questions about the Fed's future plans. 

At the moment, this issue is fundamental. Since the text of the minutes of the meeting of the Federal Committee on Open Market Operations explicitly states the need for several more refinancing rate increases. How many will there be? In what time frame? And most importantly – why?

Friday, August 25

On Friday, the macroeconomic calendar is completely empty. So investors will be able to calmly focus their attention on Jackson Hole and Jerome Powell's upcoming speech. 

The dynamics of the market will largely depend on the words of the head of the Fed, but it is still difficult to predict the tone of his speech. However, it is expected that the most likely outcome of all upcoming speeches and statements will be a strengthening of the dollar. After all, inflation in the US has accelerated again, and producer prices are rising again. That is, inflation will continue to grow further. 

Consequently, the Federal Reserve really has no choice but to continue raising interest rates. And this will significantly strengthen the dollar's position.