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North Korea says it is able to immediately launch a nuclear attack

  
Analysis, Politics
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A piece in Korean media, Dong A Libo, reporting that North Korea had described plans to “put strategic armed forces on a high alert operation”

“It means that North Korea is able to immediately launch a nuclear attack anywhere in Northeast Asia, stressing that it owns leadership for nuclear deterrent,” said Ryu Sung-yeob, a senior researcher at the Korea Research Institute for Military Affairs.
That does not sound too encouraging.
A piece in Korean media, Dong A Libo, reporting that North Korea had described plans to "put strategic armed forces on a high alert operation"

South Korea sees fresh spike in coronavirus cases amid outbreak in e-commerce warehouse

  
  Analysis
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South Korea reported 40 new cases in the past day, the highest total in 49 days

Korea

This comes after e-commerce firm, Coupang, reported an outbreak at its logistics center located in Buncheon with at least 36 cases linked to the fresh cluster at the moment.

The firm did already say that it has moved to test 3,600 people at its facility after the reported incident. Once again, tracking and tracing is going to be the utmost importance here.
The fear is that it could lead to a widespread community transmission that may result in secondary wave of infections in the country.
If you need reminding, South Korea also had an incident at the start of the month where one infected person who visited nightclubs led to a resurgence in the number of virus cases. As of yesterday, the nightclub-linked cases has increased to 257 persons.

The PBOC is expected to cut interest rates, RRR in H2 to support the economy

  
  Analysis
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What’s ahead from the People’s Bank of China, China’s Global Times with the heads up:

  • highly likely to announce interest rate cuts or reserve requirement ratio (RRR) cuts in the second half of the year
  • to help accelerate an economic recovery from the negatives induced by the COVID-19 outbreak and external uncertainties
  • cuts are most likely to be made on interest rates for the standing lending facility (SLF) and RRR
  • PBOC will use a variety of tools including reserve requirement ratio cuts, interest rate reductions and re-lending
  • the Bank wants M2 money supply and aggregate financing to grow at notably higher rates than last year
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GT citing Chinese experts examining the monetary policy related information in this year’s Government Work Report.
This policy is aimed at more support for liquidity, firms and the consumer. If it lifts China’s economy it should be supportive of China and China-proxy trades.
What's ahead from the People's Bank of China, China's Global Times with the heads up: 

OECD cuts 2020 global economic forecast to 2.4% from 2.9% previously

  
Analysis, Economy
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OECD warns that the global economy may shrink in Q1 2020

This follows their November forecast here previously. Notably, they have slashed China’s growth forecast to 4.9% from 5.7% previously. Meanwhile, in the US they forecast a 1.9% growth for the year – slightly lower by 2.0% previously.

As for the euro area, OECD sees growth of 0.8% this year, down from 1.1% previously. They note that the forecasts are currently based on the coronavirus epidemic peaking this quarter and says Japan and Europe risks a recession in their downside scenario.
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