Halister News

--ALEXANDER KWIATKOWSKI

(Bloomberg) -- Twitter met with Yahoo’s mgmt several weeks ago to discuss possible merger; bowed out of bidding process soon after, NYP reports, citing unidentified people familiar.

• Cos. spent several hrs discussing YHOO’s financials and if strategic combination might make sense
• TWTR, YHOO declined to comment: NYP
• NOTE: May 26, AT&T Said to Be Interested in Buying Yahoo Internet Business

--MICHAEL SIN

(Bloomberg) -- Referendum risk makes it hard for the Fed to move in June and introduces uncertainty about July/September because of an additional 6-to-12 weeks for things to go wrong, Citigroup head of G-10 FX strategy Steven Englander writes in note received today.

• Importance of U.S. non-farm payrolls is “inversely proportionate” to U.K. referendum risk, says Englander
• It is unclear what level of uncertainty the Fed is willing to deal with on the referendum outcome;
  • To be worried they have to think that a ‘leave’ vote is likely and market reaction will be so disruptive that patience is warranted
• Today’s unemployment rate may be more important than average hourly earnings, says Englander
• If data drops from the 190k+ range, the question is whether the economy is slowing or running out of available bodies
• Citi sees 140k new jobs vs consensus among economists polled by Bloomberg of 160k, well below the six-month average of 220k and 12-month average of 224k; range of forecasts spans 90k to 215k

(Bloomberg) -- Singapore dollar heading for a weekly gain of 0.3% vs dollar ahead of U.S. nonfarm payrolls today.

• Nikkei Singapore PMI due at 11am local; trend has shown steady declines this year, see chart
  • Singapore’s May PMI was unchanged at 49.8 in data released yesterday after local markets closed
• USD/SGD slips 0.1% to 1.3750, consolidating below 100-DMA at 1.3799; click here for chart; slow stochastics retreating from overbought territory
• Options expiring next week include 1.3680 strikes for $288m on June 7 and 1.3975 strikes for $297m on June 8
• Apple is said to consider issuing bonds in Japan, Singapore: WSJ
• GBP/SGD’s failure this week below 200-DMA at 2.0580, together with fading bullish momentum, suggests downside risks in near-term; click here for chart
• Six-month swap-offer rate down 1.3 bps to 1.40297% on June 2
• 10-year govt bond yield dropped 4 bps yday to 2.1798%
• SGD 5-year interest-rate swaps steady at 2.1200%

(Bloomberg) -- ICAP Plc has landed a contract to provide technology for China’s official inter-bank trading platform, giving Michael Spencer’s company a new cash generator in one of the world’s fastest-growing economies.

• The London-based company will supply fixed-income and currency market technology to China Foreign Exchange Trade System, or CFETS
• The deal, which uses ICAP’s EBS BrokerTec systems, is worth $65 million over three years.
• ICAP will open an office and a development center in Shanghai
• See full story here