China Removes Trade Negotiator Li Chenggang From WTO Role

The Indonesian rupiah is at risk of falling to a record low as lingering concerns over the central bank’s independence sap investor confidence, according to the currency’s top forecaster last quarter.The rupiah may weaken to 17,000 per dollar this year, said Jason Tuvey, deputy chief economist for emerging markets at Capital Economics, putting it past the all-time low set in April. The currency closed at 16,575 on Monday.Tariff worries, compounded by doubts over the government’s fiscal discipline, have made the rupiah Asia’s worst-performing currency this year. Expectations of more interest-rate cuts by Bank Indonesia may add to pressure on the currency amid equity outflows.

“The policy-making environment is still going to be the key driver here,” said Tuvey in an interview. Further efforts to undermine the fiscal rules or pressure the central bank to loosen monetary policy might spook investors, he said.Bank Indonesia delivered its third consecutive surprise rate cut in September, with Governor Perry Warjiyo saying the decision was aligned with the government’s efforts to boost the economy. That has raised questions about the central bank’s independence.

Tuvey expects Bank Indonesia to lower borrowing costs at each of the remaining three meetings this year to reach a terminal rate of 4% — anything below the level may start to concern investors, he said. The central bank meets on Wednesday.If Bank Indonesia cuts rates “to levels that investors deem to be overly stimulative and keep policy rates there for a prolonged period of time,” there might be downside effects within months to two years’ time, Tuvey said.

Market participants are also keeping a close eye on whether the government will remove or alter the budget-deficit cap as it seeks to boost spending in the coming years to revive the economy.

“It’s certainly a risk” given Finance Minister Purbaya Yudhi Sadewa’s mixed messages, Tuvey said, referring to the possibility of an adjustment in the deficit ceiling. “The fear that they’re just going to abandon the fiscal rules with no alternative put in place, for example, would be a big concern for investors.”

Source: Bloomberg Europe

Oil prices fell on Tuesday on concerns about excess supply and risks to demand stemming from tensions between the U.S. and China, the world's top two oil consumers, even as President Donald Trump said he expected to reach a trade deal.

Brent crude futuresfell 14 cents, or 0.2%, at $60.87 a barrel at 0005 GMT. The U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude (WTI) contract for November delivery, set to expire on Tuesday, eased 0.1% to $57.45. The more-active December contract (CLc2) was down 13 cents, or 0.2%, at $56.89.

U.S. President Donald Trump said on Monday he expects to reach a fair trade deal with Chinese President Xi Jinping. Disputes over tariffs, technology and market access remain unresolved ahead of their planned meeting in South Korea next week.

"I think we'll end up with a very strong trade deal. Both of us will be happy," Trump said.

Ritterbusch and Associates said in a note that the near-term trading stance on crude remains bearish, favoring selling into price advances rather than buying pullbacks.

"But, we also feel that enough geopolitical uncertainty remains to occasionally offset oil balances that are becoming more negative with each passing week," they added.

U.S. crude oil stockpiles likely rose last week, a preliminary Reuters poll on Monday showed, ahead of weekly reports from the American Petroleum Institute and the Energy Information Administration.

In Russia, Rosneft-controlled Novokuibyshevsk refinery in the Volga region halted primary crude processing on Sunday following a drone attack. Separately, a strike on the Orenburg gas plant forced neighboring Kazakhstan to cut output at its Karachaganak oil and gas condensate field by 25% to 30%.

Ambiguity around Russian oil supply persists, as Trump reiterated that India could face “massive” tariffs unless it halts purchases of Russian crude. India has become the leading buyer of discounted Russian oil following Western sanctions on Moscow.

Oil prices have been falling partly due to a bearish outlook last week from the International Energy Agency, which projected the global oil market could face a surplus of nearly 4 million barrels per day in 2026, as OPEC+ producers and rivals ramp up output while demand remains sluggish.

Source: Reuters

The Thai baht’s traditional year-end rally will be dimmed as Chinese tourists continue to shun the country and traders bet on interest rate cuts, according to analysts.The baht is projected to rise about 1% against the dollar by year-end from early trading Tuesday, a Bloomberg survey of strategists shows. That’s about half the average gain seen in the final two months of the year over the past 10 years. Sluggish exports may also limit upside, according to Credit Agricole CIB.

While the tourism high season usually supports the baht, those inflows “are not expected to feature as strongly,” this time, said Andy Ji, a strategist at InTouch Capital Markets in Singapore. If the Bank of Thailand turns more dovish and the government rolls out a gold trading tax, the baht could slide toward 33 per dollar even if the greenback stays weak, he added.A softer rally may offer some respite to policymakers after the baht’s more than 4.5% advance this year already strained export competitiveness. Shipments are under further pressure from US tariffs. The stronger currency has also made Thailand a more expensive destination for visitors, weighing on tourism — together with exports, these sectors account for about 70% of the economy.

Foreign tourist arrivals are expected to fall about 6% this year, the Tourism Authority of Thailand said — the first annual decline in a decade outside the pandemic. The slide reflects weak demand from key markets like China, where safety concerns and a stronger baht have curbed travel.The currency’s “appreciation has squeezed exporters’ income and eroded competitiveness,” said Apichit Prasoprat, vice chairman of the Federation of Thai Industries. “It’s also hurting tourism.”Markets are pricing at least one more rate cut within six months, according to swaps data compiled by Bloomberg, after an easing cycle that has delivered 100 basis points of cuts since October last year.

The central bank will keep monetary policy loose through next year due to the country’s weak economy and the risk of further global shocks, Deputy Governor Piti Disyatat said early this month.Still, the baht could strengthen if growth rebounds, US-China tensions ease, the dollar weakens as the Fed cuts rates, and gold prices stay near record highs. Nomura expects it to appreciate to around 31.3 per dollar by year-end.For now, analysts say authorities are likely to step in to curb excessive gains. Seasonal factors should offer some support to the baht, said Poon Panichpibool, strategist at Krung Thai Bank Pcl. “But if the baht is exceptionally strong against trading partners’ currencies, the Bank of Thailand could intervene.”

Source: Bloomberg Europe

South Korea’s central bank will keep its key interest rate unchanged for a third consecutive meeting on Thursday, prioritising economic stability over a recovery in growth, according to a Reuters poll of economists who expect the next rate cut in November.The Bank of Korea (BOK) raised concerns at its previous meeting about risks to financial stability amid an overheated housing market and uncertainty over a trade deal with the United States, which is likely to be finalised at the end of this month, prompting the central bank to remain on hold for now.

Nearly 95% of economists, 33 of 35, polled October 14-20 forecast the BOK would hold its base rate at 2.50% on October 23. Two predicted a 25-basis-point cut to 2.25%."It’s unlikely for the BOK to move in October because the fundamentals, both economic and the housing market, haven’t changed since August and more importantly the household debt issue Korea faces at the moment is not seen slowing down," Kelvin Lam, senior economist at Pantheon Macroeconomics, said."The BOK will watch the housing market closely to make sure it is not going to be rising much further before it starts to cut rates again. I think one in November is a potential."

After cumulative rate cuts of 100 bps over the past year, house prices have started to rebound, worsening affordability. The price-to-income ratio of an apartment in Seoul sits at 21.3, above 19.4 for London, heightening concerns in a country with one of the world’s highest household debt-to-GDP ratios.With growth underperforming due to weak domestic demand and inflation around the BOK’s 2% target, a strong majority of economists predict a 25-bps cut to 2.25% in November.

The central bank is expected to tread cautiously to avoid further depreciation of the currency as Washington has agreed to reduce duties on imports of South Korean products to 15% in return for Seoul investing $350 billion in the U.S.But U.S. auto tariffs are still in place as the countries remain at odds over the details of the investments."There is a lot of pushback and there are also people arguing it’s better off paying the tariffs than to agree to the investment deal. At the end of the day it’s about how the deal is going to be structured," Michelle Lam, economist at Societe Generale, said.

"Going forward, I think the investment deal is definitely affecting the sentiment about the Korean won. So how that’s going to be executed is still going to be quite important."The Korean won has lost around 2% since the deal was announced on July 30 and the BOK sold a net $800 million in currency market interventions in the second quarter to curb losses.Beyond this year, economists were split on the rate outlook. The median forecast showed another 25-bps cut to 2.00% in the second quarter of next year and then no change through 2026, a shift from a first-quarter cut expected in the August poll.

The poll showed Korea’s economy would expand 1.0% in 2025, slightly above the BOK’s revised forecast of 0.9%, 1.8% in 2026 and 1.9% in 2027.

Inflation was forecast to average 2.0% this year and ease slightly to 1.8% in 2026.

Source: Investing

Though the U.S. government remains shut down, the Senate is a hive of crypto activity this week, with Republican lawmakers now matching a planned Democrat meeting with industry leaders set for Wednesday.

After CEOs such as Coinbase's Brian Armstrong and Chainlink's Sergey Nazarov meet with as many as 10 Democratic senators, according to people familiar with the plans, they'll jump to a similar meeting with those lawmakers' Republican counterparts. The chief topic of conversation is the crypto industry's top policy priority: the legislation that would establish U.S. regulation for the broader crypto sector.

The bill — known in the already-approved House of Representatives version as the Digital Asset Market Clarity Act — had been advancing through the usual process in the Senate, where legislative efforts generally have to lean into bipartisanship to clear the 60-vote threshold. Republicans on the Senate Banking Committee produced a working draft, but Congress then got mired in a budget dispute that shut down the government.

And possibly more importantly, a document showing suggested Democrat language on decentralized finance leaked, causing an uproar from industry insiders who cast it as a potential deal-breaker in the negotiations.

So, the Senate Democrats and leaders from the industry set up a Wednesday meeting to hash things out. And now, Republicans will hear from them, too. In that second meeting, the industry's GOP allies will likely get an indication of which points the CEOs were told by Democrats that they're encouraging movement on.

Industry leaders involved in these meetings are said to include the heads of Kraken, Uniswap, Galaxy Digital, Solana Policy Institute and senior executives from Circle, a16z Crypto and Jito.

A prevailing sentiment from many crypto lobbyists is that it would be difficult to get the market structure bill back on track this year, and next year's midterm elections could make any serious policy efforts difficult. Without this legislation becoming law, the sector is left only halfway to enacting its policy aims in the U.S., having celebrated a first major success with a new law to regulate stablecoin issuers.

And until Congress can get the government's doors open again, lawmakers' chief focus remains on the budget dispute.

When they return to their crypto work, the Republican allies of crypto do have a significant number of like-minded Democrats across the aisle who are ready to approve major crypto legislation. But the Democrats had raised a number of issues to work on, including consumer protection, illicit-finance concerns and the conflicts of interest presented by top government officials engaging in the industry — most notably, President Donald Trump.

Both the Senate Banking Committee and Senate Agriculture Committee must produce and approve of the legislation before it can get a floor vote in the overall Senate. The Agriculture Committee has yet to publish any draft legislation.

"Any durable policy must be bipartisan," said Blockchain Association CEO Summer Mersinger, in a statement sent to CoinDesk on Monday, underlining that both parties need to be on board.

An approval in the Senate would send it over to the House for a similar vote. That chamber had already approved the Clarity Act with an overwhelming majority, and some senior members of the House have argued that the Senate could skip a lot of headaches by just voting on the House's Clarity Act and sending it directly to Trump.

Source: CoinDesk

Chancellor of the Exchequer Rachel Reeves will announce the government is cutting red tape for businesses in an attempt to boost economic growth as she prepares for a difficult budget next month.

At a regional investment summit on Tuesday, Reeves will hold out the prospect of £6 billion ($8 billion) of annual savings for firms with simpler corporate reporting rules for 100,000 qualifying businesses, according to a statement released by the Treasury. The inaugural meeting will also unveil £10 billion of private-sector investment.

Reeves sees reducing the regulatory burden on companies as crucial to achieve the growth she is seeking to deliver on election promises to boost infrastructure and put the public finances back on track. A government action plan in March concluded that Britain is too risk averse, inhibiting growth and private-sector investment. It featured a goal of cutting business administrative costs by 25%.

However, her announcement of a fresh blitz on “needless form filling” under Labour is likely to be greeted with skepticism in many quarters as British government of all stripes have made similar commitments, only to find the task more difficult in practice.

After Brexit, the previous Conservative administration promised to weed out rules that originated from the European Union. Businesses, however, often proved reluctant to radically change the regulatory environment. In 2023, the Tories under then-Prime Minister Rishi Sunak ditched plans, dubbed the Brexit bonfire, for thousands of EU-era regulations to expire automatically at the end of the year after warnings that important pieces of legislation could disappear by accident.

“A central part of our Industrial Strategy is slashing needless red tape that blocks business growth, and today is precisely about that,” Business and Trade Secretary Peter Kyle said.

Reeves is expected to confirm that thousands of companies will no longer be required to produce Strategic Reports and promise less frequent data returns and financial statements for finance firms. Private-sector investments will include £6.5 billion from residential wellness and health-care infrastructure company Welltower and £4.5 billion from the Crown Estates’ Harwell East housing project.

The policies in Reeves’ speech follow cuts to financial services red tape announced at her Mansion House address in July and recent amendments to Labour’s landmark planning bill, which would further reduce local government and legal oversight of planning applications in a bid to cut application times.

The Regional Investment Summit will see over 350 senior business figures meet with central and regional government representatives in Birmingham, central England.

Source: Bloomberg