Forex news for North American trade on April 27, 2018:
- US advance Q1 GDP +2.3% vs +2.0% expected
- US Q1 employment cost index +0.8% vs +0.7% expected
- CFTC Commitments of Traders: Euro longs drop from record
- Merkel: We have been able to reduce US trade deficit, tax reform will help
- Trump says committed to remedying trade imbalances with Europe
- Baker Hughes US weekly oil rig count 825 vs 820 prior
- NY Fed GDP Nowcast for Q2 up to 3.22% from 3.03% last week
- Canada's Freeland cites 'meaningful progress' in NAFTA talks
- April final U Mich consumer sentiment 98.8 vs 98.0 expected
Markets:
- Gold up $6 to $1323
- WTI crude down 10-cents to $68.08
- S&P 500 up 3 points to 2669
- US 10-year yields down 2.4 bps to 2.96%
- NZD leads, GBP lags
A late wave of US dollar selling hit on profit taking and trade worries. EUR/USD was chopping around 1.2100 but gained 30 pips in the final hours of trading to finish at the best levels of the day. Earlier, the pair had fallen as low as 1.2056.
USD/JPY initially kicked higher on the stronger GDP numbers but the jump to a session high o 109.54 was short-lived and prices quickly fell back to 109.30 and then continued down to 109.00 with Treasury yields negative across the curve.
Cable was battered in Europe after soft UK GDP data. A BOE hike on May 10 now looks like it's strictly off the table and cable dumped down to 1.3747 before a late bounce to 1.3780 on broad USD weakness.
The commodity currencies finished strong after tough week. USD/CAD hit 1.2900 in Asia but steadily declined to finish at 1.2834, down 35 pips on the day. The kiwi was trounced this week but caught a small bid Friday to finish 30 pips higher at 0.7091 after hitting a fresh medium-term low of 0.7040 a few hours earlier.
Have a great weekend.
