CANBERA (dpa-AFX) - The Bank of Korea will wrap up its monetary policy meeting on Friday and then announce its decision on interest rates, highlighting a busy day for Asia-Pacific economic activity. The BoK is expected to keep its benchmark lending rate unchanged at 2.50 percent.
Japan will release March figures for bank lending and producer prices. Bank lending is expected to rise 4.4 percent on year, easing from 4.5 percent in February. Producer prices are seen higher by 0.9 percent on month and 2.4 percent on year after slipping 0.1 percent on month and rising 2.0 percent on year in the previous month.
China will provide March numbers for consumer and producer prices. CPI is expected to rise 1.2 percent on year, easing from 1.3 percent in February, while producer prices are tipped to add an annual 0.5 percent after slipping 0.9 percent a month earlier.
Australia will release February figures for building approvals, with forecasts suggesting an increase of 29.7 percent on month and 14.0 percent on year after sinking 7.2 percent on month and 15.7 percent on year in January.
Malaysia will provide unemployment data for February; in January, the jobless rate was 2.9 percent.
Taiwan will release trade data for March; in February, imports were up 6.8 percent on year and exports jumped an annual 20.6 percent for a trade surplus of $12.77 billion.
New Zealand will see March results for the Performance of Manufacturing Index from BusinessNZ; in February, the index score was 55.0.
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