The Business News Week Ahead

The status of Chinese trade fittingly opens the week and outright contraction for both exports and imports is the call for May's report. Japanese machine orders will follow on Wednesday as will the latest consumer price data out of China. US consumer prices then follow and improvement for the core rate could help cool what are building expectations for a Federal Reserve rate cut. The latest assessment from the Swiss National Bank, whose rate has long been in the negative column, will be Thursday's highlight as will Eurozone industrial production. Major highlights are set for Friday beginning with the monthly round of Chinese data on industrial production, fixed asset investment, and retail sales which in April were all on the soft side. Winding up Friday will be industrial production and retail sales out of the US where rebounds out of the minus columns are forecast, results that would give policy makers on the FOMC some breathing room going into their policy debate at the June 18 and 19 meeting.