Australia Interest Rate Decision On Tap For Tuesday

(RTTNews) - The Reserve Bank of Australia will wrap up its monetary policy meeting and then announce its decision on interest rates, highlighting a busy day for Asia-Pacific economic activity. The RBA is widely expected to keep its benchmark lending rate unchanged at the record low 0.10 percent.

Australia also will see January figures for home loans, February figures for commodity prices and Q4 data for current account.

Home loans are tipped to rise 3.0 percent on month, slowing from 5.3 percent in December. Commodity prices spiked 25.3 percent on year in January. The current account surplus is pegged at A$14.3 billion, down from A$23.9 billion in Q3.

South Korea will release February numbers for imports, exports and trade balance. Imports are tipped to jump 25.2 percent on year, slowing from 35.5 percent in January. Exports are called higher by an annual 18.2 percent, up from 15.2 percent in the previous month. The trade deficit in January was $4.89 billion.

China will see February results of the manufacturing, non-manufacturing and composite indexes from the National Bureau of Statistics; in January, their scores were 50.1, 51.1 and 51.0, respectively. China also will see February numbers for the manufacturing PMI from Caixin, which is expected to rise to a score of 49.5 from 49.1 in January.

Indonesia will see February results for consumer prices. Overall inflation is expected to ease 0.02 percent on month and rise 2.1 percent on year after gaining 0.56 percent on month and 2.18 percent on year in January. Core CPI is tipped to climb 1.93 percent on year, up from 1.84 percent a month earlier.

A number of the regional nations will see February results for their respective manufacturing PMIs from Markit Economics, including Australia, Indonesia, Japan (Jibun), Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Taiwan, Thailand and Vietnam.

Finally, the markets in South Korea are closed on Tuesday and will re-open on Wednesday.