In today’s briefing:
- HEW: Bored Debasement
- Singapore Economics: Concentrated Outperformance Masks Soft Spots in Domestic Economy
- Treefera US Winter Wheat US Market Insight August 2026
- Treefera Corn US Market Insight August 2026
- Korea Sector ETFs Weekly #2 [Week Ending 21 August 2026]
- The Two-Speed Fuel Market: Why One Fuel Is Tighter Than the Other
HEW: Bored Debasement
- With market themes also on holiday recently, the USD debasement trade returned, fed by crumbs of poor policy that we doubt carry enough energy to let the theme run far.
- Flash PMIs were broadly solid, especially in the US. UK unemployment data were imputed flat while inflation’s rise was confirmed, including in the EA’s final print.
- Next week has more energy news in Ofgem’s price cap announcement. EA lending, ECB meeting accounts, and annual benchmark revisions for US payrolls are dull highlights.
Singapore Economics: Concentrated Outperformance Masks Soft Spots in Domestic Economy
- Singapore’s export-oriented sectors have extended the economy’s outperformance on aggregate, with a positive output gap for the third consecutive year.
- However, the concentration of growth in a few electronics-linked sectors masks weakness elsewhere in the economy. Indeed; this concentration has widened since 2025.
- Alternative measures of momentum for the domestic economy, such as the domestic-sector output gap and implied velocity of money, suggest weaker momentum than the headline
Treefera US Winter Wheat US Market Insight August 2026
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Cautious Bullish on the KC HRW over CBOT SRW class spread (KE-ZW). Neutral on flat wheat price.
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Treefera captures the winter-wheat crop at the first mile, at plot level.
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That resolution exposes the defining feature of the 2026 season: the shortfall sits overwhelmingly in hard red winter, while soft red winter and the white classes hold near trend.
Treefera Corn US Market Insight August 2026
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Bullish crop, cautiously bearish price — the damaging heat missed the eastern belt, where most of the crop is grown
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Following the August WASDE release on 12 August, December corn futures rallied about 3%, from a pre-release level of 469.25 cents to 483.25 cents at the close on 14 August, as USDA’s lower yield estimate came in below market expectations.
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Over the past month, headlines have pointed to a poor corn crop, driven by heat and drought across the belt.
Korea Sector ETFs Weekly #2 [Week Ending 21 August 2026]
- These 30 sector ETFs in Korea were down on average 6.8% in the past one week, significantly underperforming KOSPI which was down 0.9% in the same period.
- Among the 30 sector ETFs below, only two ETFs outperformed KOSPI including TIGER Cosmetics (up 2.7%) and TIGER Semiconductor Top10 (up 0.6%).
- Overall implied market depth continued to be very poor in Korea in the past week (90% of the sector ETFs underperforming KOSPI, 27 out of 30).
The Two-Speed Fuel Market: Why One Fuel Is Tighter Than the Other
- U.S. distillate stocks are 12.7% below their five-year average, compared with a 5.3% shortfall for gasoline, highlighting just how much tighter the diesel market is.
- Record export flows, jet-fuel competition for distillate barrels, and Russian sanctions have pushed the ULSD-WTI crack spread past its 2022 peak to unprecedented levels.
- Gasoline’s deficit fades as driving season ends and demand structurally declines; diesel’s refining-capacity constraint persists through winter heating season and beyond.
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