Important Events This Week May 19-23, 2014

Majority of this week’s events will be centred around the United Kingdom, as it will release a number of important data, including its Consumer Price Index (CPI) and the minutes of the Bank of England’s (BoE) latest meeting. Plus, there will be important reports from Japan, Canada, and the United States as well. We’ll fill you in with the details here:

Event:CPI/Core CPI/PPI (MoM/YoY, Apr) – United Kingdom

Date:May 20, 2014

Time:8:00am (GMT)

What It Is About and Why It’s Important

The country’s CPI data is expected to be slightly better in April, with the 12-month figure rising from 1.6 to 1.7 per cent, while the monthly figure is seen to move from 0.2 to 0.3 per cent.

Event:BoJ Interest Rate Decision – Japan

Date:May 21, 2014

Time:3:00am (GMT)

What It Is About and Why It’s Important

There are currently no indicators that Japan would make changes to its interest rates soon, so we can expect it to remain at 0.1 per cent.

Event:BoE Minutes – United Kingdom

Date:May 21, 2014

Time:8:30am (GMT)

What It Is About and Why It’s Important

The minutes will provide an insight on how the MPC voted in coming up with the latest interest rate decision. That includes discussions on the BoE’s policy.

Event:FOMC Minutes – United States

Date:May 21, 2014

Time:6:00pm (GMT)

What It Is About and Why It’s Important

This will provide traders an inside look on the FOMC’s outlook of the economy in the short term, and what they think the appropriate stance would be. This could provide clues on how they will vote on the interest rate in the future.

Event:GDP (QoQ/YoY, Q1) – United Kingdom

Date:May 22, 2014

Time:8:30am (GMT)

What It Is About and Why It’s Important

The country’s GDP is expected to have grown in Q1 by 3.1 per cent over the past 12 months, and by 0.8 per cent over the previous quarter.

Event:CPI data (MoM/YoY, Apr) – Canada

Date:May 23, 2014

Time:12:30pm (GMT)

What It Is About and Why It’s Important

Canada will release a number of CPI data on Friday. Its current CPI is at 1.5 per cent over the past 12 months, and its MoM CPI is at 0.6 per cent.