Forex news for Asia trading Wednesday 10 August 2016
- RBA Gov. Stevens: Current inflation target regime has flexibility
- China State Council researcher says no need to cut RRR , interest rates
- Overnight USD weakness getting another leg (part 2)
- Australia - Home loans (June): 1.2% m/m (expected 2.3%, prior -1.0%)
- PBOC sets yuan reference rate for today at 6.6530 (vs. yesterday at 6.6594)
- Overnight USD weakness getting another leg
- Australia - Westpac Consumer Confidence (August): +2.0% m/m
- Japanese machinery orders point to capex recovery ahead
- Japan - June Machinery Orders: +8.3% m/m (expected 3.2%) (& PPI data)
- Heads up for China financing data due ... this week?
- More on that Sankei piece re BOJ September Review & JGB purchase target
- Japan press: BOJ September Review may make bond purchase target more flexible
- New Zealand - REINZ House Sales (July): -10.1 % y/y (prior 6.0%)
- Preview of the RBNZ announcement due 2100GMT Wednesday 10 August 2016
- China press reports on studies of ways to handle steel company debts
- Trade ideas thread - Wednesday 10 August 2016
- Goldman Sachs' forecasts for the major currency pairs
- Oil price lower - private survey of inventory shows surprise build
- Japanese bank to hike its prime rate
The moves lower for the USD that occurred in Europe and US times continued here today once Tokyo got active.
The yen was a big beneficiary, with USD/JPY dropping down under 101.20 at one stage. Cable, too, showed strength, from just above 1.30 it tracked toward 1.3090 before halting its rise. EUR and CHF were not left behind, EUR/USD above 1.1150 and USD/CHF under 0.9800.
AUD and NZD both higher against the USD too, AUD topping for the session just over 0.77 while NZD slightly off now from a +0.7220 high (note, the RBNZ decision on monetary policy is due 2100GMT Wednesday).
News flow was subdued, but we did get a decent dose of economic data.
Japanese Machine Orders showed a good pick up on the month, and the outlook for the next quarter is for higher. But while the numbers did look promising they will not be enough to make up for the big fall in Q2 orders (down 9.2%).
Australian housing finance came in at a miss on the headline, but the details were better, if not spectacular.
The PBOC set the USD/CNY mid rate lower today, as would be expected following overnight falls in the big dollar, but the revaluation of the yuan was not as much as models were probably expecting; this is likely indicative of PBOC intentions to keep the yuan on the weaker side of maybe where it 'should' be.
Gold wasn't left behind today, continuing higher to above $1348.
Yen strength today was resisted by the Nikkei, it showed resilience.
Regional equities:
- Nikkei -0.03%
- Shanghai -0.10%
- HK +0.36%
- ASX -0.49%
More:
- Soaring Debt Has U.S. Companies as Vulnerable to Default as 2008.
- Top Chinese Fund Buys Auto Shares in Bet Economy Recovering
- Michael Phelps chalked up gold medal number 21
