Focus of the US session was on FOMC Meeting Minutes. Federal Reserve policymakers had a prolonged debate about the prospects of a pickup in inflation and slowing the path of future interest rate rises if it did not, according to the minutes of the U.S. central bank's last policy meeting on Sept. 19-20 released on Wednesday. The readout of the meeting, at which the Fed announced it would begin this month to reduce its large bond portfolio mostly amassed following the financial crisis and unanimously voted to hold rates steady, also showed that officials remained mostly sanguine about the economic impact of recent hurricanes.
"Many participants expressed concern that the low inflation readings this year might reflect... the influence of developments that could prove more persistent, and it was noted that some patience in removing policy accommodation while assessing trends in inflation was warranted," the Fed said in the minutes. As such several said that they would focus on incoming inflation data over the next few months when deciding on future interest rate moves. Nevertheless, many policymakers still felt that another rate increase this year "was likely to be warranted," the Fed said.
There will be no major data releases from Australia tomorrow. In the US session PPI and Unemployment Claims figures will be published. Analysts predict incline by 0.4% in PPI and decrease to 251,000 in Unemployment Claims.
Figures to watch:
PPI (Thursday 14:30)
Unemployment Claims (Thursday 14:30)
