ForexLive Asia FX news wrap: Asia sells the USD today

Forex news for Asia trading Tuesday 31 May 2016

Asia Tuesday headlines:

S&P are on it ... "Apartment supply boom a 'growing concern'" for Australia
Australia Q1 GDP coming up Wednesday - revised estimates (higher)
"GBP up on Brexit poll"
Looks like we'll get detail on Japan's sales tax decision at 2.30pm Tokyo time
All the Aussie data in one place
Australia - Private Sector Credit for April: +0.5% m/m (expected +0.5%)
Australia BoP Current Account Balance for Q1: -20.8 bn (expected -19.5bn)
Australia - Building approvals for April: +3.0% m/m (expected -3.0%)
Japan finance minister Aso: Ruling parties currently discussing sales tax
PBOC sets USD/CNY central rate at 6.5790 (vs. yesterday at 6.5784)
NZ - May ANZ Business Confidence 11.3 (prior 6.2) & Activity Outlook 30.4 (32.1)
USD lower across the board
Japan data - Industrial Production (April, preliminary): +0.3% m/m (expected -1.5%)
Australia - ANZ/Morgan Weekly Consumer Confidence: 113.2 (prior week 115.7)
Japan April data: Overall Household Spending -0.4% y/y (expected -1.3%)
NZD traders will have to wait an extra day for the dairy auction results
UK data - Lloyds Business barometer for May: 32 (prior 38)
Hedge funds, investment banks commission their own Brexit polls
NZ building permits (April): +6.6% m/m (prior -9.8%)
AUD and NZD orderboards
Trade ideas thread - Tuesday 31 May 2016
Brexit - latest ORB poll: Stay in 51%, Get out 46%
Attn Brexiteers: "Thatcher ‘completely & utterly’ right to keep Britain out of Euro"

US Monday holiday headlines

Rate spreads are driving CAD, not oil - CIBC
Morgan Stanley on what to expect for the major currencies now
Libya is an x-factor for oil production
It's still not the time to fight the oil rally
European stock markets finish higher
Japanese military on alert for possible North Korean missile launch
It's only a matter of time until a commodity-trading firm melts down
EUR/JPY jumps the most in a month, what's next
ECB bought €19.296bn vs €16.918bn prior in latest QE purchase count
Look for positive April revisions in nonfarm payrolls - BAML
Dangerous day for Canadian dollar traders
Canada Q1 current account balance -$16.77B vs -$16.8B expected
Canada April industrial product price -0.5% vs +0.4% expected
Trading Friday's Non-farm payrolls report - Free live webinar
May 2016 German CPI and HICP flash 0.0% vs -0.1% exp y/y

Some across the board USD selling in the Tokyo morning today as HK and Singapore entered for the day too, with the moves extended notably in AUD and GBP.

USD/JPY dipped early to lows around 110.80 before recovering to around 111.10 to be more or less unchanged on the session as I update. We are awaiting more on the sales tax delay news from Tokyo and rumour and innuendo continue to swirl. Still no word from the main man, PM Abe.

EUR and CHF both traded small higher against the USD, but these were not where the action was really.

NZD gained ground more or less steadily throughout the session, building approvals firmed, as did business confidence - both helping the NZD along.

AUD surged after its data dump, with building approvals beating estimates easily, but the main positive contribution came from the big beat on exports for Q1. This will feed into the GDP data tomorrow, with estimates for growth in the first quarter being revised significantly higher. A market short the AUD contributed to a surge toward 0.7240, and there has been a negligible pull back since the data so far.

Cable, and GBP generally, also had a strong gain. We did get a 'Brexit' poll earlier in the session, and this has been cited as a driver. More of a correlation rather than a causation IMO, but there you go.

Gold gained, up nearly $10 (OK, only 8) on the session. Oil is down a little. Oh, yes, are you joining me on Tuesday afternoon US time for the API data? Don't ... Due to the holiday Monday in the US the API data will be out Wednesday, not Tuesday. Very unAPI I am ;-).

Regional equities: