Forex news for Asia trading Friday 24 July 2015

Australia

  • S&P - could lower Australian ratings if budgetary performance does not improve
  • AUD/USD extends its fall - stops under 0.7300 hit
  • More from ABN Amro - looking for AUD/USD a LOT lower!
  • AUD hit hard on poor China manufacturing PMI for July - well under expectations

And ...

  • ABN Amro - forecast EUR/USD to parity
  • Reuters: China Cabinet says to cut import taxes on some daily necessities
  • China: Flash Caixin manufacturing PMI for July: 48.2 (vs. 49.7 expected)
  • Japan data - Nikkei flash manufacturing PMI for July: 51.4 (vs. 50.5 expected)
  • Gold ... floats like a butterf.... no wait .... drops like a rock again
  • ANZ targets EUR/USD at 1.05 by Q3-end and 0.99 by year-end
  • Goldman Sachs FOMC preview
  • Morgan Stanley on oil - looking for lower still
  • New Zealand June Trade Balance: -60m (vs. 100m expected)
  • Kyle Bass on Japanese equities, yen correlation - could breakdown at any time
  • Reuters: China slowdown? Depends on where you look
  • Citi on US yields (looking for Sep. Fed lift off) & a still lower CHF
  • Welcome to the TGIF trade ideas thread! Friday 24 July 2015
  • The Nikkei is buying the Financial Times

The big mover in the FX space today was the AUD. The background to a weak AUD has been falling commodity prices and a rate hike coming up from the Federal Reserve. The catalyst(s) today, though, was a two-fer.

  • First, the China PMI (the private-survey Caixin PMI, formerly known as the HSBC PMI) came in weak and well below expectations. AUD/USD took a hard fall under 0.7340.
  • Second, S&P affirmed Australian ratings and outlook. but tacked on a warning ... this was enough to trigger stops below 0.7300 and take us below 0.7280. (See bullets, above for more on these). AUD/USD is now below 0.7300 for the first time since 2009.

Gold, too was a big mover, losing more than 10USD (from 1090 to under 1080) before a $5 and change bounce.

EUR and CHF lost a little against the USD, GBP too but much less.

USD/JPY gained early to above 124 but gave some of it back to be around 123.90 as i update. EUR/JPY on the session has lost ground.

Oil was more or less unchanged.