Forex and Bitcoin news for Asia trading Wednesday 4 April 2018
- AUD data responses coming in - building approval data "broadly in line "
- AUD data responses coming in - retail sales "detail was positive"
- PBOC says China is to control credit risks in key areas
- NZD/USD races to session highs, threatens break of trendline resistance
- China's Caixin services and composite PMIs: 52.3 and 51.8 in March
- Australia February retail sales: +0.6% m/m(expected +0.3%)
- Australia - February building approvals: -6.2% m/m (expected -5.0%)
- Here is the funniest response I've seen to the US / China trade war
- Asian PMIs have been disappointing in March, casting doubt on economic growth strength
- Japan PMIs (March): Services 50.9 (prior 51.7) & Composite 51.3 (prior 52.2)
- More on White House re Amazon - policy changes possible
- New Zealand - ANZ Consumer Confidence for March: +0.2% m/m (prior +0.6%)
Banks:
- Views on the NZD - Citi like NZD/JPY; Westpac doesn't like NZD
- Westpac update the view on the New Zealand dollar: 0.69 mid-year target
- Westpac on the Australian dollar - lower but the pressure is mostly via crosses
The Australian dollar was a big gainer on the session (big is a relative term in Asia forex trade). It traded steady into the local data releases and then gained, adding on 30-odd points at its high just over 0.7715 . The data releases of note for AUD were Australian building approvals (a miss), which took a back seat to the more important retail sales release (a solid beat indeed) and China PMIs (the lesser focus services and composite).
Prior to these, though market focus was on headlines re US tariffs on China imports and Chinese responses. There were loads of news items but the most important was this I highlighted:
And, in that post you will find links to all the other trade-related posts if you wish to follow the story in more detail.
We also got hawkish comments from Federal Reserve Board of Governors Lael Brainard:
- Fed's Braniard spoke earlier - recap on her swing a little more hawkish (there were quite a few posts on B's comments - this post is a summary and has links to all if you'd like to follow them more closely).
Currency movement was limited, AUD (as noted already) traded better on the session, as did the kiwi and CAd (against the USD).
EUR/USD and USD/CHF were both less active with smaller ranges, while USD/JPY is net a little bit down on the session in a small range.
Cable popped higher, though - but with no specific news seemingly having much importance for it.
Still to come:
