We are now in the full swing of reporting season with headline results coming in broadly inline with expectations with earnings weakness being front and centre for commodity related issuers. But as has been the case for the past few years macro headlines have been dominating market performance in the past week. U.S. crude oil futures (also known as West Texas Intermediate) took another leg down overnight following a higher than expected inventory in the US (among other things) and are now at a 6 year low. This is not the only commodity being effected with copper and iron ore still struggling to find a bottom. This weakness is primarily driven by weakness in China but if also being impacted by uncertainty about the timing of the Federal Reserve raising rates. In the domestic bond market the exciting (but not really useful for retail investors) news for Australian investors is that Apple Inc is likely to issue a benchmark transaction. Whilst retail investors can’t buy the Apple bond issue it will prove the capacity of the Australian Bond market to place bonds and attract other major international companies to follow suit in the future.