Trump Deal Looms, China's 11 Crucial Days, U.S. Growth: Eco Day

(Bloomberg) -- Happy Friday, Asia. Here's the latest news and analysis from Bloomberg Economics to help get your day started:

• U.S. officials are preparing a final trade deal that Donald Trump and Xi Jinping could sign in weeks, as Chinese retaliation against tariffs costs U.S. firms about $40 billion a year in lost exports. Meantime, there's a risk that negotiations shut out the rest of the world
• A crucial 11 days for China's economy begins next week when leaders gather to detail priorities for the year; China's mounting pile of distressed debt has elevated market players' attention to one of its less obvious economic data points
• The U.S. economy was steadier than thought at the end of last year, but it's probably too soon to give it a clean bill of health for 2019. Carl Riccadonna concurs: while the economy appears to have dodged a bullet, the coast isn't clear
• Vice Chairman Richard Clarida said the Fed can be patient with interest-rate rises given muted inflation; here's a summary of recent remarks by Fed policy makers
• Australia's property slump deepened in February, as stricter lending standards dry up the flow of credit to investors and home-buyers
• The ECB needs to cut its economic forecasts to bring them in line with reality -- and that will inevitably result in adjustments to policy guidance, argues Jamie Murray. The race to succeed Mario Draghi as ECB president looks increasingly like a Franco-Finnish affair
• Brexit continues to take a toll , with new figures showing a fall in U.K. business confidence and continued property market weakness
• India's economy slowed considerably with little sign of a quick recovery, as political tensions with Pakistan emerged as a new risk to join global headwinds and tighter domestic financial conditions
• Argentina is moving in the right direction on several measures closely watched by investors, but labor market data that's key for citizens reflect a different -- and more depressing -- reality
• Indonesia's maverick finance minister, Sri Mulyani Indrawati, reckons her country could do a lot worse than follow South Korea's example of exporting rat-skin products in the 1970s
• Most Venezuelans showed up to work in quiet defiance of President Nicolas Maduro's abrupt order that carnival holidays begin Thursday instead of next week

To contact the reporter on this story: Michael Heath in Sydney at mheath1@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Nasreen Seria at nseria@bloomberg.net, Chris Bourke

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