Diary: Aussie Rates, US Jobs, Japanese Sentiment, ECB, COE Meets

US jobs, the Australian Reserve Bank's monthly interest rate decision, Chinese manufacturing and Japanese business sentiment will dominate a trading week shortened for the great Easter bun and chocolate festival.

After China's data was released yesterday, the performance of manufacturing surveys for the US, rest of Asia and Europe will be out today (including Australia) and the same survey for the services sector is out later in the week.

The RBA board meeting happens tomorrow.

No rate cut is expected, but the AMP's chief economist Dr Shane Oliver says could happen and "is quite likely".

If it doesn't happen, then the odds are firming for one in May, just ahead of what is expected to be a tough 2012-13 budget from the federal government.

That will also be after the March quarter inflation figures later in the month.

"While the RBA may prefer to wait till after the release of the March quarter CPI data on April 24, which we expect to show benign inflation, my assessment is that there is actually a good chance of a rate cut this Tuesday," Dr Oliver wrote in his weekly note.

We also get retail trade and building approvals for February from the Australian Bureau of Statistics and industry car sales figures for March from the Federated Chamber of Automotive Industries.

Building approvals are out today, retail trade tomorrow, Trade on Wednesday for February car sales later in the week and overseas departures and arrivals on Thursday.

Dr Oliver says we can expect soft readings for building approvals and house prices (today) and retail sales (tomorrow) but a return to a trade surplus for February (Wednesday).

In corporate news, Ten Network is due to release earnings results on Thursday. The company has already downgraded them.

Energy Resources of Australia will release its March quarter production report this week, while beach sands miner Iluka is down to release its report as well.

QBE will hold its annual general meeting and will update the market on the outlook after a poor 2011 result, especially in the second half of the year.

Other meetings during the week will include: Cougar Energy Ltd, Capital Mining Ltd, Geopacific Resources NL, GBM Gold Ltd, Emu Nickel NL, Baru Resources Ltd, Perth, Avanco Resources Ltd, Blue Energy Ltd, Paramount Mining Corporation Ltd and Renaissance Minerals Ltd.

And OneSteel announces its new corporate name tomorrow.

In the US the jobs report is out next Friday and many analysts expect from 150,000 to well over 200,000 new jobs were created last month.

The consensus seems to be around 200,000 to 220,000 jobs and for the unemployment rate to have remained steady on 8.3%.

Economic indicators this week include the surveys of manufacturing and services from the Institute for Supply Management, construction spending, factory orders and domestic car sales as well as several reports on the labour market, culminating in Friday's payrolls number.

US car sales data for last month are due from the industry tomorrow night, our time.

US car sales have been strong for several months and forecasters are looking for another solid performance for March with sales expected to be running 20% higher or more than a year ago and at an annual rate close to 15 million vehicles.

Along with dealing with a short week and a lot of economic data, investors will have to contend with Tuesday's release of the minutes from the most recent Federal Open Market Committee meeting from the Federal Reserve.

The US earnings calendar is light, with Monsanto Co and Constellation Brands Inc the only S&P 500 companies due to release results.

Investors will be gearing up for the unofficial start of earnings season the following week, when Alcoa Inc reports on April 10.

Also being released are the monthly same-store sales from major retailers on Thursday (but not Wal-Mart).

In Europe, both the ECB (Wednesday) and the Bank of England (Thursday) are expected to leave monetary policy unchanged.

Industrial production data for February is due in the UK, along with manufacturing production data for the month.

And the NIESR group will release its March quarterly gross domestic product estimate.

The OECD last week estimated that the UK economy had slowed 0.1% in the three months to March after the 0.3% slide in the December quarter.

Final eurozone PMI's for March and retail sales for February will be released on Wednesday.

(China's two PMI's were missed yesterday).

EU unemployment rate data for February will also be released as will producer prices for the 27 member group.

In Japan, the Bank of Japan's Tankan survey for the latest quarter is due out later today and is expected to show a small rise in sentiment among big companies, especially with the recent fall in the value of the yen.

That was after the release of data for February showing a surprise rise in retail sales and inflation, but a fall in industrial production.