Forex news for Asia trading Thursday 21 April 2016
- SAFE: China to promote unified onshore and offshore yuan exchange rates
- China's 'zombie' steel mills fire up furnaces, worsen global glut
- Ex-BOJ's Iwata: To beat deflation, BOJ must lower interest rate to about -1%
- China SAFE: Cross-border outflows have eased recently
- Australia: NAB Q1 Business Confidence 4 (prior 5 )
- Reuters Survey: Japan companies oppose expansion of negative interest rate policy
- People’s Bank of China sets yuan reference rate at 6.4803 (vs. yesterday at 6.4579)
- New Zealand - ANZ Consumer Confidence (April) +1.7% m/m (prior -1.4%)
- "Soros has warned of a 2008-like catastrophe before"
- More from Soros: China and US definitely cooperating on currency policy
- UK press: Greece 'could leave eurozone' on Brexit vote
- Soros says China's March credit growth is a warning sign
- Japan LDP big cheese calls for 20tln yen stimulus to aid quake response
- NZ migration data for March ... "All aboard!"
- Bank of Canada's Poloz says might take >3 years to recover from oil shock
- German Finance Ministry monthly report: Outlook mixed
- NZ data - ANZ Job Ads (March): +2.9% m/m (prior +1.2%
- What's going on with AAPL? Apple delays its earnings call.
- JP Morgan moves it RBNZ rate cut call forward - to next week
- Japan press: PM Abe has decided against lower house elections in July
- Japan press: Support builds for delaying Japan's tax hike
- BoC's Poloz still going: Export recovery has been very hesitant
- Trade ideas thread - Thursday 21 April 2016
- NZ March Credit Card spending down 1.1% m/m (prior -0.4%) & +4.8% y/y (prior +7.3%)
Oil & its commodity buddies on the front foot in Asia today; iron ore was limit up on the Dalian exchange, rebar, silver, gold ... all higher.
The yen was subdued, USD/JPY caught in a 30-odd point range not far off its overnight high. Ahead of the ECB today in Europe EUR and CHF were tightly range bound also. Cable drifted a tad lower in the Asian morning but has since recovered to be barely changed.
AUD and NZD were little different, some AUD/NZD buyers has seen AUD a better performer than the NZD, and indeed AUD/USD is near to session highs as I update. Again, though, not big ranges for either.
The major data focus today was on the NAB business confidence and conditions for Q1 for Australia, and while both were down a tad on the previous quarter they are maintaining decent levels and the survey details were positive, especially for capex and employment intentions (see bullets above). AUD benefitted also from the better tone for commodities here today also.
As mentioned, gold higher today, as was oil. Regional equities:
- Nikkei +2.14% (Note: Mitsubishi found to have falsified fuel mileage figures ... their shares were suspended from trade today after being smashed Wednesday and likely again today)
- Shanghai +0.42%
- HK +1.65%
- ASX +1.12%
Still to come: European Central Bank at 1145GMT, followed by Draghi presser at 1230GMT
