• The dollar hit a two-week high versus the yen on Thursday, extending its gains after strong U.S. economic data bolstered expectations for a solid U.S. jobs report later this week.
The dollar rose to 110.615 yen at one point, its strongest level since Aug. 16. It last changed hands at 110.52 yen, up 0.3 percent from late U.S. trade on Wednesday.
• Defense Secretary Jim Mattis openly differed with his commander in chief over North Korea on Wednesday, the latest example of a once-rare public display of disagreement by top U.S. aides that has become more frequent under President Donald Trump.
“We are never out of diplomatic solutions,” Mattis told reporters, just hours after Trump said in a tweet that “talking is not the answer” to the standoff over North Korea’s nuclear weapons and missile programs.
• South Korea and the United States were finishing annual war games on the Korean peninsula on Thursday amid high tension over North Korea’s weapons programmes and a disagreement between U.S. President Donald Trump and his defence secretary on how to respond.
• Britain and Japan will pledge on Thursday closer cooperation on defence, cyber security and counter-terrorism as Prime Minster Theresa May looks to strengthen relations with one of her closest allies ahead of Brexit.
• Visiting her Japanese counterpart Shinzo Abe as Tokyo responds to the increasing military threat posed by North Korea, May toured Japan’s flagship Izumo helicopter carrier for a military briefing with Minister of Defence Itsunori Onodera before attending a national security meeting.
• Foreign Minister Luis Videgaray said on Wednesday that Mexico will leave the negotiating table if U.S. President Donald Trump goes ahead with a threat to start the process of withdrawing from the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA).
On Monday, Trump said he would probably need to terminate NAFTA to get what he considers a fair trade deal with economic partners Mexico and Canada, and revisited his campaign promise that Mexico would pay for a border wall.
• Major U.S. railroads have warned that it could be a long time before normal operations resume in the Houston area where Tropical Storm Harvey has caused catastrophic flooding.
• Harvey, previously a tropical storm, has weakened into a depression, the U.S. National Hurricane Center said on Wednesday.
• Growth in China’s manufacturing sector unexpectedly accelerated in August, suggesting the world’s second-largest economy is still expanding at a healthy clip despite rising financing costs and a cooling housing market.
The official Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI) rose to 51.7 in August from the previous month’s 51.4, and remained well above the 50-point mark that separates growth from contraction on a monthly basis.
• Gasoline prices in the United States hit $2 a gallon for the first time since 2015 on Thursday as flooding from storm Harvey knocked out almost a quarter of U.S. refineries, while crude prices remained weak as demand dropped following the outages.
U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures were trading at $46 per barrel at 0708 GMT, slightly above last day’s settlement, when prices fell by 0.8percent intraday.
International Brent crude was at $50.74 a barrel, down 12 cents from the previous day, when the contract fell by more than 2 percent.
Reference: Reuters
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