The US is mostly higher
As North American traders enter for the day, the CAD was the strongest and the AUD is the weakest. The USD is mostly higher after a stronger run yesterday. Gains and losses in the major currencies is relatively modest (the currencies are not running away today). After months of steady jobless claims, the market will need to digest another potentially shocking number. The last 3 weeks have shown jobless claims come in at 3,307K, 6,867K and 6,606K for a total of 16,780K. The expectations is for 5,500 new workers being added to the initial jobless claim data this week.
The ranges and changes reflect the relatively quiet in the market. The largest range vs the USD is the GBPUSD at 71 pips. The pair is down -32 pips after running -60 pips at the lows The USDJPY moved higher but has retraced back to the midpoint in the morning snapshot. The JPY crosses are mostly near the 0 line as traders ponder the next move in those "risk on"/"risk off" currency pairs.
In other markets:
- Spot gold is up $19.60 or 1.16% at $1736.86
- WTI crude oil is up $0.25 or 1.26% at $20.12. The low price extended to $19.77. The high reached $20.53
The premarket for US stocks are showing modest gains:
- Dow +15 points
- S&P index up 6 points
- NASDAQ up 36 points
in the European equity markets major indices are higher:
- German DAX, +0.8%
- France's CAC, +0.2%
- UK FTSE +0.3%
- Spain's Ibex,
- Italy's FTSE MIB +1.2%
In the US debt market, yields are mixed with the 2 year up modestly. The 30 year is down -3.3 basis points. The 2-10 year spread has narrowed to 40.79 basis points from 43.47 basis points at the close yesterday:
In the European debt market, the benchmark 10 year yields are mixed. Germany and UK yields are modestly higher while France, Spain, Italy, and Portugal yields are lower.
