Central Banks Watch: Jackson Hole Most Watched after BoE, RBA, FOMC Minutes; Listen to Yellen and Stevens

Policy meeting minutes of the Reserve Bank of Australia, the Bank of England and the FOMC are the main central bank events next week, but the three-day Jackson Hole symposium from Thursday will be in focus for major announcements by Fed Chair Yellen.

"Re-Evaluation of Labour Market Dynamics" will be the main topic of discussion at the 21-23 August meeting, and the Fed's evaluation of the US jobs market will provide fresh cues regarding when the world's largest economy will start hiking interest rates.

US unemployment rate has fallen to 6.2% in July, breaking below the range of 6.3-6.6%, which the Fed has predicted for until end-2014.

The strength of US jobs data has kept the dollar sentiment upbeat but Yellen remarked that the slack in the labour market needs to be addressed first before hiking the rates on the basis of the unemployment rate.

Minutes

The RBA on 19 August will release the minutes of the 5 August meeting where the main rate was left unchanged at 2.5%. In the policy statement, the central bank reiterated its stance that the strength of the Australian dollar needed to be weaker for the economic recovery to be strong enough.

From its neighbourhood, inflation expectations report by the Reserve Bank of New Zealand will be another central bank event to be watched on Tuesday.

The next RBA event in the week is governor Glenn Stevens's speech on 20 August.

The BoE will release its 7 August meeting's minutes on 20 August and will be watched for any likely change in the voting pattern. The consensus is for 100% votes in favour of no change.

The central bank had kept the bank rate at 0.5% and the asset purchase target at GBP375bn at the last meeting, in line with expectations. The sharp drop in sterling of late was after the BoE's quarterly inflation report and the press conference by governor Mark Carney.

Even a positive surprise in the GDP data that came later did not lead to a reversal in the pound, and therefore, the minutes will be watched keenly for any additional cues in line with the central bank's stance revealed in the 13 August inflation report and Carney's remarks.

The FOMC will also publish its last meeting minutes on 20 August. Rates were left steady at the 30 July meeting, and the dollar was largely firm the days after that helped by the fundamental weakness of major counterparts like sterling and the euro.

The market this week is likely to look beyond the FOMC minutes to the Jackson Hole speech as the event is likely to cover important policy matters.

Others

Iceland, Paraguay, Namibia and Ghana are the other countries scheduled to decide policy rates in the week to 22 August.

Iceland and Paraguay will decide on 20 August and the current rates are 6% and 6.75% respectively.

Namibia will also announce its rates on Wednesday. The last change there was a hike on 18 June when the rate was raised 25 basis points to 5.75%.

Ghana will set the Monetary Policy Rate (MPR) on 22 August. The African country has seen its main interest rate rising 3% since January this year to 19%.