Forex news for Asia trading Wednesday 20 March 2019
The big event ahead is the FOMC announcement, due at 1800GMT:
- Sth Korean media reports Kim Jong Un may announce today on nuke talks
- Recap of RBA Bullock speech today … Sydney apartments financial stability risk
- Nissan Dongfeng reportedly have cut China car sales target by 8%
- BOJ dep gov Wakatabe says Japan is making progress towards fiscal health
- China media: China may cut Reserve Ratio in Q2
- Bloomberg - Pilot Who Hitched a Ride Saved Lion Air 737 Day Before Deadly Crash
- China's President Xi to visit France - will sign deals while there
- PBOC sets USD/ CNY reference rate for today at (vs. yesterday at 6.7062)
- More from RBA's Bullock - RBA encouraging banks not to tighten too much
- Reuters: BOJ board at loggerheads on next policy move - January meeting minutes
- Brexit - Tory's said to be revolting. Oh ... wait, over extended Brexit delay.
- RBA's Bullock upbeat on household's ability to service debt
- Bank of Japan meeting minutes (January) out now
- Australia Westpac leading index for February comes in unchanged m/m (prior -0.01%)
- BNZ raise their 2018/19 milk price forecast to $6.50 (from $6.25 previously)
- Reuters Tankan: Japan manufacturers sentiment at its lowest since October 2016
- Hedge Fund says it has spotted the 'trade of the century' (spoiler: buy gold, sell stocks)
- New Zealand February jobs report - job openings up 0.9% m/m
- WSJ report that 'behind the scenes' US President Trump pushing for China deal
- FedEx says world trade is slowing - cite heightened uncertainty
- New Zealand BoP Current Account balance for Q4 NZD -3.256bn (expected -3.55bn)
- Brexit - BBC report UK will definitely send letter seeing extension, on Wednesday
- ICYMI … more Asian forex intervention
- Heads up NZD traders - ASB revise their Fonterra milk price forecasts, with 'upside risk'
- Trade ideas thread - Wednesday 20 March 2019
- Oil - private survey of inventories released (official govt data due Wed morning US time)
A higher USD underlay currency moves today, the dollar up nearly across the board.
USD/JPY was a notable gainer (relatively speaking), up above 111.50 to highs circa 111.69.
AUD/USD, NZD/USD both fell. The AUD move was blamed on comments from RBA Assitant Gov Bullock (see bullets above). An early (much earlier) heads up for a lower AUD was given well before her speech, a fall waiting to happen it seems.
We got some data from NZ today but the data of focus from the country comes tomorrow, Q4 GDP. BNZ and ASB both raised their milk price forecasts today.
EUR/USD is down only small on the session, as is cable. We get inflation data from the UK Wednesday morning, which might take the focus of Brexit for about half a second.
Chinese stock markets saw falls today, as did gold.
Still to come:
