Forex news for North American trade on September 21, 2020:
- Lagarde: We are attentive to the euro's appreciation
- Chicago Fed August national activity index 0.79 vs 1.19 expected
- Fed's Kaplan says he now stands by rate pledge, despite dissenting
- Chinese leaders debate whether to speed up blacklist of US companies - report
- US household net worth rose by record $7.61 trillion in 2nd quarter
- Kudlow: Would like to provide new tranche of small business aid
- UK reports 4368 new Covid cases
- OPEC watching Libya oil restart closely, needs to see if sustained
- Canada August new housing price index +0.5% vs +0.3% expected
- Fed's Kaplan: Once US gets to the point of lower unemployment, not sure rates stay at zero
Markets:
- Gold down $39 to $1911
- WTI crude down $1.48 to $29.63
- US 10-year yield down 2.2 bps to 0.67%
- S&P 500 down 41 points to 3277
- USD leads, NZD lags
It was the first day of fall and fall is what the markets did. Equities were hammered in Europe and that spread to the US until a very late-day rally that was led by tech stocks, including Apple.
In the past two weeks, the FX market has largely shrugged off equities but the increase in turmoil today finally led to the big dollar bid. It was some of the currencies that had held up the best, including NZD, that were hit hardest.
At the same time, the strengthening dollar undercut the pound and sent it back close to six week lows. The euro also fell 70 pips on the day but managed to finish 40 pips off the lows in an important technical move late to get back into the range.
It was a similar story in gold as it finally cracked to as low as $1882 at the height of worries but it managed to rebound above the key $1900 level into the close.
This all had the feeling of a 'moment of truth' and while the bulls were wounded, it wasn't a mortal blow, at least not yet. That sets up a very interesting week.
