Global markets seem to be taking comfort in Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell’s balanced tone with regard to further interest rate hikes. 

Following that comment by Powell, we have more economic data including initial jobless claims and personal income figures out of the US last night.

Question is - to what extent do the data releases support the case for the central bank to tone down its pace of interest rate hikes? 

Away from the US, November turned out to be the best month for Asian stocks in nearly 30 years, but yet private surveys showed factory output slumped for the month. Why the discrepancy?

On Market View, Prime Time’s finance presenter Chua Tian Tian spoke with Azeem Sheriff, Market Analyst, CMC Markets APAC & Canada for more.