Event risks ahead, looking busy for the Aussie this week - Westpac

Analysts at Westpac explained that Australia’s busy data week starts with Q4 company profits and inventories (also an estimate of aggregate wages etc), which will help shape forecasts of GDP (Wed). 

Key Quotes:

"Westpac looks for a commodity price-driven 4% q/q rise in profits and a 1% gain in inventories. Also due at 11:30am Syd/Mel is Jan building approvals. The series is always prone to volatility though December’s -20% m/m slide was large even by its standards. We look for +1% in Jan.

In Asia, there will be at least passing interest in the Feb China services sentiment survey, which has been running around 54, well above the manufacturing purchasing managers indexes.

The US data focus should be the Feb non-manufacturing sentiment survey which is expected to remain in the high 50s, a very strong reading though probably not matching the 14 year highs seen in the Feb manufacturing equivalent."