The US government has launched new national security investigations into semiconductor chips, semiconductor manufacturing equipment, and pharmaceutical goods and their ingredients, which are expected to lead to new tariffs on their imports. On the other hand, President Trump has signaled that he could consider a temporary reprieve on his 25% tariff on automotive imports in order to allow companies time to move manufacturing to the US.
Egypt and Qatar have announced that they are working towards a new USD 7.5bn investment package from the Gulf state. The support from Qatar follows similar pledges from other GCC states over the past several years including the USD 35bn Ras el-Hikma investment by the UAE and a USD 5bn investment pledge from Saudi Arabia.
Turkey’s current account deficit widened to USD 4.41bn in February from a deficit of USD 4.00bn the previous month, revised from USD 3.80bn on the initial print. Reserves fell by USD 2.9bn in the same month. Goods exports were moderately higher in March compared with February but this was offset by a greater increase in imports.
Today’s Economic Data and Events
13:00 Germany ZEW survey expectations, April. Forecast: 10.0
16:30 Canada CPI inflation, % y/y, March. Forecast: 2.7%
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Equities
Commodities
OPEC revised its oil demand growth forecast for 2025 by 150k b/d to 1.30m b/d and by a similar amount for 2026 to growth of 1.28m b/d. The exporters’ alliance noted US trade policy in their downgrade of demand expectations for this year.