Thats the point where we see intervention. Some saying that 160 could be the in the sand. Certainly its the question of how meaningful and house of santa, how effective would any sort of Government Intervention be when youve got that ongoing cap between the fed and the boj . What we are seeing here for equities at the start of the day is a little bit of pressure, following what happened on wall street overnight because we had the s p 500 on its longest losing streak in several months. Really big tech bearing the brunt of that. Earnings and focus, given we have a number of big tech names reporting over the coming days. That could leave clues on the health of the u. S. Economy. Also whether we will see any sort of big ai led rally sustaining the momentum. Lets chains on. Take a look at whats happening in korea to start the day here. The korean won firm are here against the greenback. Six tense of 1 . Broadly, equities just modestly in positive territory. Fx has been a big talking point. The imf spring meetings are underway in washington. We know that we do have the finance chiefs from the u. S. , japan, korea leading. They are all expressing concern. As we also hear from the bank of korea governor saying that the juan levels are really diverging at this point for the fundamentals. Annabelle take a look at how we are tracking when it comes to the first couple minutes of trading. To the open here in australia. The a sx up to chance of 1 . We are seeing quite a bit of leadership from the likes of materials, Consumer Discretionary also doing ok at the moment. We are focusing on some of the big names like bhp. Iron ore output rising despite some of the weatherrelated woes. Of course, the downside demand story from china as well. Pretty good picture for bhp, shrugging off some of those concerns. Us trillion bonds opening the session higher. The 20 year auction attaching Strong Demand there. The aussie dollar also expanding that bounce before we have local jobs data do as well. Expect to see a pullback in those march numbers after a big jump that we saw in february that was quite surprising and a little bit of a question mark over that. Take a look at oil as well. Brent crude up by three tons of 1 , holding the drop. U. S. Stockpiles expanding to that tenmonth high. Balancing out that largest decline that weve seen in three months for crude. Watching treasuries. A big jump against longduration demand with that 20 year treasury auction. Quite a bit of participation there. The warning when it comes to potentially higher for longer continuing to play out here. Lets bring in our executive editor paul dobson. So the drumbeat of stubborn inflation, higher for longer. Rates will stay here as long as its needed. Potentially we wont get to easing at all this year. Is it finally starting to price through the markets . Yeah. I think so. The odds are being placed and for what the fed is going to do this year. Less than two cuts. If you look at Market Pricing in some of the enthusiasm for equities, its gone off the boil a little bit as well. Although we are also heading into earnings season, of course which tempers those bets as people wait to see whether that can be delivered. Whats been really interesting overnight is this meeting between japan and south korea and janet yellen. They appear to have come away with it with a kind of implicit green light from janet yellen to be able to intervene in the currency market if they feel the need. The commentary that came out of japan and south korea, this is a serious concern. Make no mistake. Syrias he said really carefully. It gives you a sense that both authorities and south korea and japan are really vexed by this and ready to move and dont feel that there will be anything to hold them back now. Its no surprise for me that you see some gains for the juan at the start of the trading session. We have more of the strength and recovery in the yen as well overnight. Annabelle beyond the fed and what we see in currency markets, another big focus for investors is what we are getting out of earnings. Not a grout great outlook coming through from the company. Do you see that casting a shadow today . Paul it will be important for the asian chipmakers. They will be paying a lot of attention to that. We saw weakness in the magnificent seven u. S. Stocks overnight. Nvidia particularly. There will be a little bit of weight on oil markets. People continue to assess how strong that demand is. For chips and ai, we also get the earnings from tsmc later. Thats going to be crucial for what it all looks like in our region and particularly for equities in taiwan and the overall benchmark thats waiting there as well. Annabelle of course, asia executive editor for asian markets paul dobson. The tsmc earnings do out. We will be watching those very closely. What also we tracking . The chipmaker story in the session. Tsmc numbers on the docket. Coming out with earnings. Really disappointing investors as well, given we had a forecast for sales that came in below analyst expectations. Concerns around the demand outlook. Thats going to be a key thing to track in this session. Thats the state of play there. Chipmakers are the minors as well. What weve got for production figures that are continuing to come in from different names. Santos is one of those, just a few minutes away from trading. But we do have most of the minors moving higher in the session. Bhp is another one, iron ore output rising despite rain, despite the concerns about china demand. Thats been a really key dynamic in the middle story. It comes down to, what is the demand outlook from china looking like . What is the health of the economy looking like as well . Haidi how tenuous are these relationships on a geopolitical level . Weve been reporting President Biden threatening higher tariffs on chinese imports. He is seeking to win over workers ahead of the november election. Biden met with members of the united steelworkers in pittsburgh on the second day of the threeday swing through battleground states. Take a listen. Weve got a population that has more people in retirement than working. They are not importing any. They are xenophobic. Nobody else coming in. Theyve got real problems. Haidi for more, lets bring in jenny marsh. We know that from beijing and washington, both sides understand theres a degree of domestic political parser posturing. How much of this is based on policy and how much of it is positioning before november . Jenny its an awful lot of election posturing right now. There are real concerns in the u. S. Around the chinese economy, their industrial policy. You can see from the proposal of the steel tariffs that biden was looking at overnight, since the trump era tariffs. Hes really signaling to the industries that the union is strong and he has a lot of core voters that hes going to be tough on china. Those actions are largely symbolic. The ship loading power is something which really could hurt china if they do end up trying to click chinas ability in that area. At the same time, the fees that he is proposing are likely not going to move the needle. They might just hurt the american economy. They are less competitive than other places. Annabelle yeah. A little bit more bark than bite. How much does this set the tone going into the u. S. Election . Jenny yeah. The turn right now for china is concerned. You see a slew of industries that are realizing that theres this very hawkish election on china on both sides. And all the industries, a slew of industries piling in. Even the aviation sector in america last week was calling on biden the block new fights from chinese airlines. Saying that xis prorussia stance was anticompetitive. The whole gamut of industries right now. I think for china, this is a very sensitive time because its election posturing. Its hard for subsequent administrations to roll them back. The best thing for beijing is to try to keep its head down, respond as it can but not retaliate too strongly. Try to mitigate the impact of this election season. Haidi theyve already found retaliation when it comes to the probe into the ship building industry. At the same time, we are hearing reporting that Antony Blinken will be headed to china for a four day trip on april 23. This will be the latest highlevel u. S. Official to visit. How important is it that we continue to see this engagement at a very high level . Jenny i think with the election season being so tense, the engagement is important. The expectations for what lincoln will achieve during his trip will be quite low. He isnt going to come out with deliverables. The fact that they are still talking is going to stabilize the relationship in this very volatile time which is only going to get more volatile as we get closer to the november vote. Annabelle that was our Greater China editor. Still ahead, tsmc expected to report a rebound in Earnings Growth as demand for chips use and Ai Development booze process. Boost profits. Eq ta show joins us to discuss mna trends in japan and the impact of the Companies Corporate government reforms. More ahead. This is bloomberg. Starti is never easy, but starting it eight months pregnant, thats a different story. With the chase ink card, we got up and running in no time. Earn unlimited 1. 5 cash back on every purchase with the chase ink business unlimited card from chase for business. Relax into a caribbean state of mind. Visit sandals. Com or call 1800 sandals. Every second counts. 120 seconds to add the finishing touches. 900 seconds to arrange the displays. If youre short on time for marketing constant contacts powerful tools can help. You can automate email and sms messages so customers get the right message at the right time. Save Time Marketing with constant contact. Because all it takes is 30 seconds to make someones day. Get started today at constantcontact. Com. Helping the small stand tall. Iconic American Company for more than a century. It should remain a totally American Company. [applause] americanowned, american operated by American Union steelworkers. The best in the world. Thats going to happen. I promise you. Annabelle that was President Biden earlier, vowing to keep u. S. Steel americanowned. Take a look at how nippon steel is trading at the moment. Guaranteed to stay u. S. Own. President biden telling steelworkers, Union Workers in that key swing state of pennsylvania on this threeday trip there. On that same trip, he has proposed raising 301 tariffs on chinese steel and aluminum. All of this as we see this political positioning and engagement with Union Workers ahead of the november election. Talking about this iconic American Company. Take a look at how we are faring when it comes to the japanese trading session. We are just about 15 minutes into the state of play there. Quite a bit of downside. U. S. Stocks extended those losses as well overnight. The nikkei 225 down by seven pence of 1 . Chipmakers in particular in focus as we see the rest of the sectors really under pressure. A lot of earnings coming through from that sector. Tokyo electron as well to be closely watched. Our next guest runs the Asia Business of a cutie with about 247 billion in assets. They say japan is a top priority as a push to improve government standards, leading to a wave of deals and peten of desta to potential been is for shareholders. Great to have you with us. Weve seen this broad wave of exuberance over this new era for japanese assets. How has that translated into your part of the business . Yes. Thanks for having me today. We see this wave of activity that is starting to happen as a result of the changes in governance and improvements in japan. Thats led to a lot of shareholder activist activity. Its creating more deal flow in the private equity industry. Theres also an understanding that the Public Markets are not necessarily the best home for valuing these businesses here. We Just Announced the take private of a company which was a fan familyowned business. We partnered with the family to take the company private. Its one of the largest ever partnership deals like that. You could call it a management buyout where we teamed up with the family to take the company private. Its a 1. 8 billion transaction. The thesis is that we think we can really invest in the business for the longterm and prove the governance and prove the execution of the strategy as a private company much better than we could do in the Public Markets. We see more and more of these types of opportunities here in japan. Annabelle the management buyout aspect is interesting. Does that translate to major industry reshuffles . Do you see this strategy as being one of the ways that we see some of the inefficiencies being washed out . Jeaneric yes. I think the Partnership Strategy is interesting. We are also seeing a lot of entrepreneurial activity in japan as well. Thats another theme that we are investing behind. We announce the investment in a Company Called hr brain which is a Software Business in the hr software space. Thats an entrepreneurial led company. Its an example of how things are changing in japan. You are starting to see significant entrepreneurial activity at scale, tackling markets like the Software Market which is a new emerging space and trying to gain share from the traditional Client Software companies here in the country. Annabelle beyond software, which industries are you looking at in particular for different targets . Jeaneric well, e cutie. The heritage of it is the Wallenberg Family which goes back to the mid1800s. Thats five generations of an industrial heritage. Our industrial focus and our industrial perspective on being having a mindset of being an owner of an industrial asset as opposed to being a financial owner, it is something that we think resonates very well here in japan. So we are very focused on working with Industrial Companies and helping those management teams and those Companies Reach their full potential. Annabelle theres been a perception in the past that perhaps directors even within japanese Bluechip Companies could be hesitant to work with overseas firms. Are you noting a shift in mentality perhaps thats taking place as well . Jeaneric yeah. I think things are changing for the better. I think the combination of the government taking the lead on this and coming out and saying, if your company is trading below book value, you need to do something about it and you need to be accountable for that if you are a director of a listed company. I think theres also been numerous examples in our industry here of private equity firms that have created tremendous value as owners of these businesses. So the directors of the boards of these companies that have sold those corporate divisions are feeling more confident about what happens after they sell. I think theres been a fear in the past that if you sold a business to a private equity firm, that it would be slashed, it would be highly levered and there would be all sorts of awful things happening. But actually what has transpired , our Business Model is that we build companies and we future proof businesses and make them more successful and more profitable. Employees benefit. Shareholders benefit. Society benefits. The fact that that model is taking root makes it easier for the boards of directors of companies to view private equity as a force for good, as a positive force for change and having a positive impact. I think that mindset change quite important. Haidi are you seeing much of an impact when it comes to the sustained weakness in the end, in terms of the appeal of deals . Jeaneric yes. I think thats been a headwind for existing investments. The yen has really come down 30 or 40 in the last several years. So if you are not hedged, you would have borne the brunt of that. However, thats been partially offset by rising valuations and rising stock markets, rising multiples. I think at this point, the entry point looks very interesting. Although we are not in the business of trying to predict currency movements, you would think that entering at 150 or above is attractive. From a currency standpoint. In the longer term as Interest Rates normalize the rest of the world and become more comparable. I think generally, we are bullish on japan. Not really just for the currency reasons but for a lot of the structural reasons that you are citing and whats happening here. We just think the market is poised for growth in terms of private Equity Investment into the country. Annabelle that was the chairperson at a cutie eqt asia. This. When you automate sales tax with avalara, you dont have to worry about things like changing tax rates, exemption certificates or filing returns. AvalarAhhh Ahhh Ahhh ahhh annabelle taking a look at how currencies are faring in the session so far. Watching the japanese yen, the korean won. Both of those currencies firmer against the greenback. Weve been hearing from the finance chiefs of the u. S. , japan, and korea. Acknowledging the weakness and pressures that those local currencies are facing. Aussie dollar, kiwi dollar. Little changed at this point in time. The broader story has been resilience that weve seen in the greenback in that phase of stronger u. S. Growth as well. Lets get more on the outlook for the dollar. We are really tracking what it means, these expectations around the fed and where we go from here. But when youve got the fed saying, be patient, we cant cut too soon, it just tells you that we can really expect Dollar Strength to continue for some point time to come as we continue to track whats happening with yields. Haidi the diversions is hard to close with the boj in no rush at this point to accelerate into the next steps of tightening at all. Take a look at our treasuries. We saw a bit of longduration demand jumping