Forex news for Asia trading Tuesday 4 February 2020
- China's President Xi Jinping - coronavirus outbreak a “major test” for China’s government
- RBA announce no change to the cash rate, as expected
- PBOC comment on the large liquidity injection today - resolution to boost confidence
- More on the GDT (dairy) auction due Tuesday London time -what's priced
- Hong Kong said to report its first coronavirus death
- Japan plans to build as many as 22 new coal-burning power plants
- PBOC sets USD/ CNY central rate for today at 6.9779 (vs. yesterday at 6.9249)
- FX option expiries for Tuesday February 04 at the 10am NY cut
- LG Display stops production in Nanjing until Feb 9, Guangzhou operating normally
- Bank of Japan Governor Kuroda is to appear in Japan's parliament from 2.30pm local time
- China's Global Times on the economic disruptions from coronavirus
- China officials reporting 20,438 total coronavirus cases
- South Korean vice fin min flexing on the FX market - will tackle any herd behaviour
- Hyundai has halted some production in South Korea citing China supply chain disruption
- AUD and NZD risks from coronavirus
- NZD traders - heads up for the GDT dairy auction coming up Tuesday London time
- Australia weekly consumer confidence: 108.5 (prior 108.0)
- Moody's on China - credit implications from the virus outbreak are evolving
- China's Hubei province now has 414 deaths from coronavirus, and 2,345 new cases
- Trade ideas thread - Tuesday 4 February 2020
- More from Fed's Bostic: Fed will 'taper' the pace of repo activity, but the balance sheet will still grow slowly
- New Zealand Building Permits for December: +9.9% m/m (prior -8.5%)
- Fed's Bostic: Inflation is below where the Fed wants it
Coronavirus news continued out of China with more cases, more fatalities, a death in Hong Kong (the second death outside mainland China), another hefty liquidity injection (net larger than Monday;'s) from the PBOIC and an increasing pace of tales of economic disruption.
Metals futures opened lower on the session but soon rebounded, as did Chinese equity markets. USD/CNY was set below 7 by the PBOC, which appears to me to be an effort to project calm.
Apart from the virus developments market attention was focused on the RBA meeting. The widely held view going in was that the Bank would remain on hold, which was correct. The Reserve Bank of Australia left the cash rate unchanged at 0.75%. The Australian dollar popped higher, above 0.6720 briefly, on the announcement, dragging NZD/USD along for the ride (though not to the same extent).
EUR, GBP, yen all little changed against the USD. gold barely changed also. Oil up small during the session.
Shanghai Composite opened lower but bounced back. A big fund injections from the PBOC today (net much bigger than Monday's) did not hurt:
Kids, this is what we used before candlestick charts, its called an OHLC chart.
