The pair hit a high of 0.7996 on the day after a jolt from Australian job figures earlier
We had Australia employment numbers for December in the Asian session and it was pretty positive overall though there was a bit of a miss in the unemployment rate (but the participation rate was higher too).
AUD/USD spiked to session highs before paring gains and falling to session lows thereafter. So far, buyers are still finding support from the 100-hour MA as they did last Friday - and that is still keeping the pair underpinned. As Mike noted here, there are bids lurking near the 0.7950 area that's helping as well.
But once again, on the upside the 0.8000 proves too tough of a level to crack. Yesterday, we saw a jump higher on the back of dollar weakness to a high of 0.8023 only for the pair to give back gains after the dollar recouped losses. Today's spike ran into sellers near the figure level as well. I've been harping on this level for the past couple of days, and it is a key level to watch out for - psychologically.
If buyers start to show further signs of exhaustion up here, then this is where we could start to see things come falling back down again. We've already cleared two key data points for the AUD and we're still not seeing a break above the 0.8000 level, so let's see if the other data points could act as the catalyst:
18 January - December employment change & unemployment rate
18 January - China GDP figures
31 January - Q4 2017 CPI figures
6 February - December retail sales data*
6 February - December trade balance data*
*prior to RBA meeting
Though let's not forget about the USD part of the equation too. The current risk event for the dollar is the possible government shutdown - where there's still some uncertainty on whether or not Republicans can garner enough votes to pass the funding bill.
