- ECB’s Ordonez: Seeing certain amount of good news from global economy, but central banks have to remain cautious on economic outlook
- Soros: Downward trend in financial crisis is easing. Expects upturn which won’t offset downturn and then stagnation. Expects Asia first out of crisis.
- Soros: U.S dollar already weak. Does not see it losing much value against euro
- French March industry output -1.4% m/m, much weaker than median forecast of -0.5%. February data revised downward, to -0.9% from initial -0.5%
- Italian March industry output -4.6% m/m, much weaker than median forecast of -1.6%. February data revised downward to -4.6% from previous -3.5%
- Japanese opposition leader Ozawa quits
- Saudi FinMin: Does not expect decline in significance of dollar in coming years
US dollar and yen little firmer this morning, likes of sterling, aussie and euro give ground. Risk aversion slightly heightened as global stockmarkets give ground, S&P futures off some 11 points. Growing feeling stocks may have come too far, too fast.
Weak French and Italian industrial output data (see above) will also have dented risk appetite a little.
EUR/USD came under pressure when hedge funds sold aggressively up in the 1.3620/30 area in early Europea trade. Soros comments (see above) will have weighed a little on EUR/USD.
Cable came under fairly heavy pressure. UK clearer seen aggressive seller. Also decent selling seen coming out of Geneva. A scary unemployment forecast from a UK think tank will hardly have helped matters.
