- Japan May all industry activity index 1.1% vs 1/2% exp
- Japan May final leading index 110.7 vs 110.5 prior
- German June PPI unchanged at 0.0% m/m. 0.6% y/y
- Nikkei closes down 1.48% to 14589.91
- Doubt on Japan lifers increasing foreign bond holdings
- French fin minister sees overreaction to Bernanke comments, pushing for tax changes at G20
- Italian May industrial orders rise 3.2% vs 0.6% prior m/m
- Angela Merkel says progress being made in crisis hit countries, German election will be very close
- Greek current account balance 0.036bn from -1.228bn y/y, Tourism receipts up to 1.054bn from 0.761bn
- Spanish Q2 house prices fall 2.4% from Q1. Down 7.6% from 2012
- UK June PSNB £10.234bn vs £9.45bn exp. Budget deficit revised lower to £116.4bn
- Italian finance ministry planning to use shareholders as collateral
- Italy’s Saccomanni happy with ECB collateral shift
- GE sees strong US growth in earnings report
- China removes interest rate restrictions, remains unchanged for mortgages
The European session started with weakness in USD/JPY falling on the back of the lower Nikkei. We broke 100 down to 99.81 before recovering into the European open. The recovery took us back up to 100.50 were sellers came in to cap the move.
EUR/USD was looking strong after an overnight rally but started to fade through the morning. Stop hunters in EUR/GBP led to sellers jumping on EUR/USD and we slid to 1.3097. EUR/GBP fell from 0.8630 down through to 0.8590.
GBP/USD remained firm busting 1.5250 the move was short lived until the PBOC announced the rate policy changes and we topped out at 1.5282
AUD/USD was languishing around 0.9170, again until the PBOC announcement. We bolted straight up to 0.9235 and remain above 0.9200 at 0.9212.
