Market Sentiment Watch:  It turned out that yesterday's weak Chinese PMI wasn't the end of the world for commodities or the recent broad market rally. In energyland, on equities front, things were a little more mixed with natural gas rallying on warmer weather and oil holding out hope that OPEC will pull back on the throttle at next week's meeting (recent reports show signs of slowing exports out of Saudi, Venezuela, and Kuwait). Our expectation is that the group doesn't change the aggregate produciton quota but that Saudi gets help from Kuwait as they work to quietly support prices away from the headlines while they watch Iraq production mount. In today's post please find comments on the natural gas review and yesterday's news for HK and SDCJF. Look for a duller session late today as traders and analysts head out early to extend their long weekend.  

Ecodata Watch: 

• Durable goods came in at +3.3% vs +1.4% expected and a prior reading of -6.9%

In Today’s Post:

1. Holdings Watch
2. Commodity Watch
3. Natural Gas Inventory Review
4. Stuff We Care About Today –  SDCJF, HK wrap
5. Odds & Ends

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Market Sentiment Watch: The Fed presented a mixed message yesterday with Ben saying not to think too hastily on tightening but the Fed minutes pointing to tapering desired by a "number" of Fed members, as early as the June meeting. Overnight China PMI contracted sneding euqity and oil futures lower (the Nikkei was off 7.3% overnight). European flash PMI came in slightly better than expected but futures are not budging on that. OPEC meets next week and they have at least a couple of reasons to rein in their production quotas now. In energy land we finally saw a nice tic up in both gasoline and distillate demand in the weekly EIA numbers … while one week does not a trend make this demand is needed to forestall a dip in utilzation and corrosion of current oil prices which as we have been writing for a couple of months now are a bit lofty for our liking. In today's post please find the oil inventory review, the natrual gas preview, comments on WPX and a few other odds and ends. 

Ecodata Watch: 

• Jobless claims came in at 340,000 vs 343,000 expected and 363,000 last week,
• Markit Flash PMI (China) came in at 49.6 vs 52.1 last month,
• Flash PMI for the Eurozone came in at 47.7 vs 47.2 forecast, 
• We get New Home Sales at 10 am EST (F = 430,000, last reading was 417,000),
• We get the FHFA Home Price Index at 10 am EST (no forecast, last read was 7.1% Yoy) 

In Today’s Post:

1. Holdings Watch
2. Commodity Watch
3. Oil Inventory Review
4. Natural Gas Inventory Preview
5. Stuff We Care About Today – WPX
6. Odds & Ends

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