April starts out risk-on with a focus on China at the start of the week

China has pledged to expand financial market opening.
U.S., China resume trade talks in Beijing after 'productive working dinner'.

Today's markets in China should be interesting, for we have already seen a positive sign in Chinese manufacturing and services date with more news from the sector due later today. There is risk-on sentiment to the start of the new quarter which has seen the commodity complex a touch higher and the Aussie the following suit with a pop at the start of the week, presumably reacting to the Chinese data from over the weekend.

Sunday’s stronger than expected China official manufacturing PMI, which bounced from 49.2 in Feb to 50.5 in Mar, a high since Sep 2018. The official services PMI rose from 54.3 to 54.8. We will have the Caixin manufacturing expected at 49.9 and in line with the prior number - An upside surprise there will put the data back into expansion and certainly underpin a bullish bias for risk-FX, such as the Aussie (on course for 23.6% Fibo / trend line resistance target) and AUD/JPY.

The Chinese stock closed higher on Friday, chalking up the third straight month of gains with trade tensions subsiding on renewed hopes of progress in U.S.-China trade talks.and as investors cheer Beijing's pledge to further liberalise financial markets.

• The blue-chip CSI300 index .CSI300 ended up 3.9 percent to 3,872.34 points, while the Shanghai Composite Index .SSEC closed up 3.2 percent at 3,090.76 points.
• For the week, CSI300 edged up 1 percent, SSEC slipped 0.4 percent.
• For the month, CSI300 was up 5.5 percent, while SSEC gained 5.1 percent, both posting their third month of rises in a row.

So far this year, the Shanghai stock index is up 23.9 percent and the CSI300 has risen 28.6 percent , while China's H-share index listed in Hong Kong is up 12.5 percent. Shanghai stocks have risen 5.09 percent this month.

Trade talks on a positive route

On trade talks, the latest news was that the U.S. and Chinese officials had conducted talks aimed at nipping the trade dispute between the world's two largest economies in the bud with an aim of a trade agreement by the end of this month, with U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin on Friday saying he had a "productive working dinner" the previous night in Beijing.