Forex news for Asia trading on Wednesday 16 June 2021
- Daimler, Volkswagen cutting working hours at some of their plants - chip shortage
- ICYMI - cryptocurrency index fund manager Bitwise raised US$70m from Kravis, Druckenmiller, and others
- Oil - plenty of analysts looking for circa $100/bbl
- PBOC sets USD/ CNY mid-point today at 6.4078 (vs. yesterday at 6.4070)
- Westpac says expects the RBA will not have to wait to 2025 to hike the cash rate
- Australia - Westpac leading indicator for May: -0.06% m/m (prior +0.2%)
- AUD/USD support zone around 0.7680 tested after RBA minutes
- US Pentagon considering permanent naval task force to counter China in the Pacific
- Japan Core Machinery Orders for April +0.6% m/m (expected 2.5%)
- Japan trade balance for May -187bn yen (expected Y -77bn)
- The UK competition watchdog to investigate the dominance of Apple & Google
- Australia weekly consumer confidence 111 (prior 110.7)
- More on a US Federal judge blocking Biden’s pause on new oil & gas leases
- Société Générale says USD/JPY above 110 the "selling zone" - adds that the FOMC unlikely to be hawkish
- NZ data, Q1 current account.
- Australia's trade minister says wants a free trade deal with the EU
- RBNZ adds a house price control tool
- RBA minutes released yesterday - little new info
- Attention Bitcoin miners - kicked out of China? Mine from Texas instead!
- PREVIEW ... - awaiting the FOMC
- Trade ideas thread - Wednesday 16 June 2021
- Private oil survey data shows large draw in headline crude oil inventory
- China May 'Activity data' due Wednesday 16 June 2021 - Industrial Production, Retail Sales, Investment
There were some minor moves across major forex rates during the Asian session here today with some position-squaring (and opening!) continuing heading into Wednesday US Federal Reserve Federal Open Market Committee decision (1800GMT) and Chair Powell's press conference following (1830 GMT).
EUR/USD has ticked a few points lower, and the USD also traded a little higher against the yen and CHF. Cable is barely changed, as is USD/CAD. Both the Australian and New Zealand dollars added a few points against the US dollar. Please note ranges for all were very small indeed, if you are inclined to dismiss the moves I have described as irrelevant it would be difficult to argue with you.
There was no fresh news of impact, data releases were from NZ, Australia and Japan (see bullets above). There is still data to come from China today, due at 0700 GMT.
Oil continued to tick higher, helped along somewhat by a large (largest in 5 months) headline draw (but do note the 'product' builds - see bullets above).
Gold dribbled a little lower, towards its US afternoon lows but not quite getting there. BTC/USD straddled $40K.
