Next week is a busy one for central banks. The Reserve Bank of Australia, which meets Tuesday, is not expected to change rates because of inflationary pressures and concerns about continuing weakness elsewhere, which could hurt their exports. The European Central Bank and the Bank of England are also not expected to change policymaking rates. The ECB remains obsessed by inflationary concerns relating to the rounding up of prices that occurred with the switch to euro currency and coins. Most judge the price jump to be temporary, however. The ECB is also worried about the size of pending wage agreements in the current round of labor negotiations getting underway in Germany. The Bank of England continues to monitor the British economy, which has avoided the global recession and inflation thus far. Last, the Bank of Japan meets and finds itself with virtually no policy alternatives left in their arsenal to combat deflation and the eroding economy.

With the data flow abating somewhat this week, investors will have time to recover from the previous onslaught and do some evaluation. However, market players remain tremulous as they try to measure the impact of the U.S. accounting mess. Investors won't be as accepting of profit statements for a while and will be looking for reforms to prevent a repeat of this episode.

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