Auschwitz 80th anniversary gathering raises difficult questions

Hello and welcome to the working week.

The next seven days will start in sombre mood. Monday’s international Holocaust commemoration will be both significant and difficult for many people. World leaders are gathering in Poland for the 80th anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz death camp by Allied forces in the second world war. Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who will be among those for the event at the gate to the former Auschwitz-Birkenau camp, has been shielded by the Polish government from arrest under the International Criminal Court’s warrant for alleged war crimes in Gaza. German Nazis murdered approximately 1.1mn people in Auschwitz, mostly Jews, along with Poles, Roma and Soviet prisoners of war. On this auspicious memorial day, I recommend Simon Kuper’s recent column on his great uncle Leo’s book, which seeks an answer to the question: what is genocide?

Commemorations of a different sort will also be happening for most of this week, primarily on the other side of the globe. Lunar New Year arrives on Wednesday, beckoning in the year of the snake. China’s central bank has pumped in record amounts of short-term funds to prevent the holiday cash crunch, but expect news reports of chaos and crowds at airports, on roads and on railways across the region as people seek to spend time with family from Tuesday onwards.

This, along with the Australia Day public holiday on Monday, will limit the amount of markets, corporate and economic news from south-east Asia. But we still have several significant economic data reports (notably inflation and fourth-quarter GDP estimates in the US and Europe), a rush of company results announcements (including about a fifth of S&P 500 companies) plus interest rate decisions from the US Federal Reserve and the European Central Bank among others.

Debate is swirling on Wall Street about when the Fed will resume its rate-cutting cycle, given the uncertainty of President Donald Trump’s tariff plans, which could fuel a resurgence in US inflation. The central bank is widely expected to hold its benchmark rate between 4.25 and 4.5 per cent this week at least, after three consecutive cuts. Investment manager Pimco last week said it expected rates to be held until there was “more clarity either on the data front or the policy front”.

It is a different picture for the ECB, whose president Christine Lagarde has strongly signalled more rate cuts to come amid signs of weak growth and diminishing price pressures in the Eurozone. Investors have already been pricing in a series of back-to-back moves in the benchmark deposit rate over the first half of 2025 on signs of weak growth and diminishing price pressures.

The flow of earnings over the coming days includes a rush of Big Tech, Big Pharma and aerospace companies (also very big) reporting. Five of the Magnificent Seven tech stocks will ride into town to provide their quarterly numbers (Alphabet and Nvidia will report next month) and most are expected to present market-pleasing figures. My colleague Rob Armstrong, in his excellent (premium subscriber) newsletter Unhedged, has warned about disappointment from one: Apple.

Another company that is having difficulty making its business model fly is Boeing. The Seattle-based plane maker is expected to report a widening quarterly loss and its biggest annual loss since 2020 as it struggles to revive production of its strongest-selling 737 Max jet after a quality crisis and weeks’-long strike sapped output in late 2024.

One more thing . . . 

Pessimists have a lot of material to work with from the current news cycle. This week will bring more foreboding with the publication of the latest Doomsday Clock prediction of how close the human race has got to its own extinction with dangerous technologies of its own making.

But Sunday is also Groundhog Day, which gives us a chance of cheer if the hibernating rodent emerges with a prediction that spring will come early, at least in North America. This is also an excuse to watch (again, possibly) the joyous, and eponymous, Bill Murray film.

Alternatively, you could do what I did last weekend (twice) and watch the new Bob Dylan biopic A Complete Unknown, reviewed here by the FT’s Danny Leigh.

What are your plans for the week ahead? Email me at [email protected] or, if you are reading this from your inbox, hit reply.

Key economic and company reports

Here is a more complete list of what to expect in terms of company reports and economic data this week.

Monday

• Australia: Australia Day observed. Financial markets closed

• South Korea: Seollal (lunar new year) holiday. Financial markets close for four days

• Results: AT&T Q4, Dr Martens Q3 trading update, Ryanair Q3, WR Berkley Q4

Tuesday

• China: Lunar new year’s eve. Financial markets closed

• France: January consumer confidence data

• Hong Kong, Singapore: Financial markets close early for Chinese New Year

• UK: British Retail Consortium (BRC) January Shop Price Index

• Results: AG Barr trading update, Boeing Q4, Brown & Brown Q4, BXP Q4, Computacenter pre-close trading update, Foxtons FY trading update, General Motors Q4, Invesco Q4, Kimberly-Clark Q4, Lockheed Martin Q4, Logitech Q3, LVMH FY, Nucor Q4, Paccar Q4, Pets at Home Q3 trading update, Royal Caribbean Q4, RTX Q4, SAP Q4, Starbucks Q1, SThree FY, Stryker Q4, Sysco Q2, Wickes Q4

Wednesday

• Australia: December consumer price index (CPI) inflation rate data

• Brazil: Banco Central do Brasil’s interest rate announcement

• Canada: Bank of Canada’s interest rate announcement

• Japan: Bank of Japan publishes the minutes of its last meeting

• US: Federal Open Market Committee’s interest rate announcement

• Results: ASML Q4, AkzoNobel Q4, Corning Q4, Fresnillo Q4 production report, General Dynamics Q4, Hess Q4, IBM Q4, Meta Q4, Microsoft Q2, Morrisons Q4, PayPoint Q3 trading update, Tata Motors Q3, Tesla Q4, Western Digital Q2, WHSmith AGM trading update

Thursday

• Asian Development Bank Institute two-day online conference: From Crisis to Resilience, Shaping the Future of Banking in Asia and the Pacific

• EU: European Central Bank’s interest rate announcement. Also, Q4 GDP estimate and December unemployment data

• France: Q4 GDP estimate

• Germany: Q4 GDP estimate

• US: Q4 GDP estimate

• Results: ABB Q4, Alfa Financial Software Holdings Q4 trading update, Altria Q4, AO Smith Q4, Apple Q1, BBVA Q4, Blackstone Q4, BT Group Q3 trading update, Canadian National Railway Q4, Cardinal Health Q2, Caterpillar Q4, Cigna Group Q4, Comcast Q4, CVS Group trading update, Deutsche Bank FY, Dow Q4, Electrolux Q4, Glencore FY production report, Greencore Q1 trading update, International Paper Q4, H&M FY, Intel Q4, James Halstead HY trading update, Marsh & McLennan Q4, Mastercard Q4, NEC Q3, Nokia Q4, Northrop Grumman Q4, Rank Group HY, Roche FY, Sage Group Q1 trading update, Sanofi Q4, Shell Q4, Sherwin-Williams Q4, Southwest Airlines Q4, St James’s Place FY new business update, STMicroelectronics Q4, Telia FY, United Parcel Service Q4, Visa Q1, Wizz Air Q3

Friday

• Effective date for the implementation of Thames Water’s restructuring plan, following bondholder meetings in November to approve an initial tranche of £1.5bn of funding as part of the water company’s plan to raise up to £3bn to support the restructure

• Australia: December producer price index (PPI) inflation rate data

• EU: consumer expectations survey

• France: January harmonised index of consumer prices (HCIP) inflation rate data

• Germany: December labour market and retail sales figures, plus January CPI and HICP inflation rate data

• UK: Nationwide House Price Index

• US: December personal income and outlays data

• Results: Aon Q4, Baker Hughes Q4, Chevron Q4, Colgate-Palmolive Q4, ExxonMobil Q4, Fujitsu Q3, Hitachi Q3, Komatsu Q3, Novartis Q4, PPG Industries Q4, Ricardo HY trading update, Samsung Electronics Q4, Weyerhaeuser Q4

World events

Finally, here is a rundown of other events and milestones this week.

Monday

• International Holocaust Memorial Day

• France: Paris Fashion Week Haute Couture begins in the French capital

• Poland: Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum holds an 80th anniversary commemoration of the liberation of Auschwitz with a ceremony held in a special tent built over the gate to the former Auschwitz-Birkenau camp. Guests include King Charles

• UK: journalists and legal bloggers will be allowed to report on family court cases across England and Wales for the first time today

• UK: energy secretary Ed Miliband will be questioned by MPs on the government’s flagship net zero policy, with questions likely to include support for airport runway expansions

Tuesday

• China: Spring Festival, a national holiday, begins and runs until February 4

• UK: Omagh Bombing Inquiry Commemorative Hearings begin in Northern Ireland

• Reform UK hosts a dinner for as much as £25,000-a-head in Mayfair, which is expected to raise well over £1mn for the populist rightwing party’s coffers

• US: Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists announces the 2025 Doomsday Clock time. Last year, the clock was reset at 90 seconds to midnight, the closest to midnight it has been in its nearly 80 years of existence

Wednesday

• Lunar new year, celebrated in countries across south-east Asia

• Azerbaijan: municipal elections

• UK: Bank of England governor Andrew Bailey appears before the Treasury committee, answering questions on the latest Financial Stability Report, detailing the current state of the financial system and ways to strengthen it

• US: Senate Finance Committee hearing to consider the nomination of Robert F Kennedy Jr to be secretary of health and human services

Thursday

• UK: quarterly crime statistics published by the Office for National Statistics Separately, the BRC publishes annual retail crime statistics, showing the cost to shop owners

Friday

• EU economic sanctions on Russia due to expire, unless extended

• France: Six Nations rugby tournament opens with France vs Wales in the Stade de France in Paris

• UK: Brexit safety and security declarations for EU imports come into force. Today is also the fifth anniversary of the UK leaving the EU

Saturday

• India: Budget speech by finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman

• UK: end of the alcohol duty freeze, introduced on February 1 2024 by the then chancellor Jeremy Hunt to help support pubs and the hospitality sector

Sunday