Financial News to know before trading today

*Stocks were generally higher in Asian trade

*Stocks were generally higher in Asian trade. Australia led the way with a two percent gain, the Nikkei added more than one percent and the Hang Seng was up 0.4%. Bucking the trend was Shanghai which lost 0.6% on the session. European indexes are broadly higher, with the Footsie currently higher by almost 1.4% and the Dax up a bit more than one percent. US stock futures are higher by about one percent as I write.

*The Q2 reading of Australia's GDP was the best in three years with quarter on quarter growth of 1.2%, better than the 0.9% forecast.

*The August reading of China's manufacturing sector Purchasing Managers Index was up a half point on the month to 51.7, a couple tenths better than forecast.

*The July reading of Germany's Retail Sales was -0.3%, well below the gain of 0.5% that was expected. That is the second month in a row in which Sales fell 0.3% and the fourth month in five that showed a decline.

*The final August reading of Germany's manufacturing sector PMI was unrevised at 58.2; the index was 61.2 in July.

*The August reading of Switzerland's manufacturing sector PMI was down 5.5 points on the month to 61.4, far short of the estimate of 65.8.

*The August reading of the UK's manufacturing PMI was down 2.6 points on the month to 54.3. It had been expected to fall only a fraction to 57.0.

*US mortgage applications were up 2.7% in the week ended August 27. Applications for purchase were up 1.8% and those for Refi rose 2.8%.

*The Challenger Groups says that in August there were 34,768 job cut announcements, that is down 55% from last August. Announced job cuts last month were the fewest since June 2000.

*ADP is scheduled to release their estimate for August private sector non-farm payrolls at 7:15am CDT, it is expected to be +15k. The August reading of the ISM Manufacturing Index is due out at 9:00am CDT. The headline figure is forecast to fall about three points from the month before to 52.7 and the estimate for Prices Paid is 55.3, down from 57.5 in July. Also due out at 9:00am is the July reading of Construction Spending, it is expected to fall 0.5% on a monthly basis.

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Financial News to know before trading today

By: Ronald Russo

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