Forex news for Asia trading Friday 24 March 2017
- Philippines allows suspended miners to ship out nickel ore - Reuters
- Here he is! BOJ's Kuroda: No reason to reduce monetary accommodation
- Where's Kuroda?
- More from South Korea - could be labelled a currency manipulator
- Yonhap says North Korea is prepared for another nuclear test
- EUR/USD orderboard
- USD/JPY & EUR/JPY orders
- AUD and NZD orderboards
- US healthcare politics - timings for the Trumpcare vote Friday
- PBOC sets USD/CNY central rate at 6.8845 (vs. yesterday at 6.8856)
- Fitch: China efforts to keep economy growing at current pace would build financial risks
- PBOC issues guidelines strengthening mortgage loan risk management
- More from Fed's Kaplan: 3 rate hikes this year reasonable baseline
- BOJ Governor Kuroda to speak today at 0330 to 0430GMT
- Japan - Nikkei Manufacturing PMI for March (preliminary): 52.6 (prior 53.3)
- USD gaining mid-morning here in Tokyo
- Japan PM Abe denies he or wife made donations to principal of school
- BoE's Vlieghe says inflation does not mean rate increases
- Rep Chris Collins says house members have been told will be vote on Friday
- Rep. Mark Amodei: House majority leader McCarthy says will be a vote Friday
- Reuters report: Mulvaney says Trump is done negotiating, vote Friday
- UNCONFIMRED: Mulvaney says Trump is done negotiating - wants a vote Friday
- US VP Pence says making progress on passing Trumpcare bill
- Fed's Kaplan says we think household sector is in pretty good shape
- Japan data - Reuters Tankan shows manufacturing index highest since April 2014
- The IMF sure has a weird take on the G20 rejection of free trade
- Trade ideas thread for Friday 24 March 2017
- New Zealand trade balance for February: -18m (expected 180m surplus)
- Heads up for NZ trade data at 2145GMT ... but I'm really waiting on the Truckometer
- Economic data due from Asia today - Federal Reserve speaker also
- Revised estimates on Trumpcare proposal from CBO, lower budget savings
- UK press: "Controlled explosion heard in Westminster: reports"
- ICYMI: ... ForexLive Americas FX news wrap: Healthcare vote delayed
News flow was again dominated by US healthcare news as negotiations continued ... for a time at least. News broke as Tokyo kicked off for the day that President Trump "is done negotiating - wants a vote Friday". As that was confirmed and more detail came to light the USD found its feet, rallying against EUR, CHF, GBP, yen. AUD/USD and NZD/USD remained stubbornly bid (for a while ... it didn't last ... but I'll get to that).
As is often the case during the Asian time zone ranges were not large, USD/JPY up around 50 off points on the session before stabilising, EUR/USD down 25 or so, for example.
Cable is down around 40 or so points, we did hear some comments from a Bank of England MPC member saying rates don't necessarily have to go up if inflation rises (see bullets above - Vlieghe the lovey dovey).
AUD and NZD eventually seemed to succumb to the USD otherwise-across-the-board strength. Both fell to new lows (compared with overnight trade)
There were various other items, but these were minor compared with the focus on US politics. The vote is apparently scheduled to begin sometime in the 2pm to 4pm (NY time) window Friday (1800 to 2000GMT). As the markets are winding down for the week, with Europe and the UK gone home leaving not too much liquidity at all. The scene is set for an interesting US afternoon.
I should note, check out Kuroda's comments, he was speaking at a Reuters event and he certainly gave them value for money, he went on and on and on. Net some very dovish yen remarks in there (see bullets above). Federal Reserve Dallas President Kaplan also spoke, not just on the economy and monetary policy but also touching on energy, as befits a Dallas Fed head.
Regional equities:
- Nikkei +0.88%
- Shanghai -0.07%
- HK -0.08%
- ASX +0.76%
