The forex trading headlines for Asia trading today: Monday August 19, 2013
- Japan July trade balance in at Y -1024.0bn (vs. expected deficit of 773.5bn yen, & prior result a deficit of 180.8bn yen). This is the third largest trade deficit on record, and marks the 13th consecutive month of deficits
- July ‘adjusted’ balance in at Y -944.0bn (vs. expected at -741.3bn, and prior of -663.2bn, revised from -568.7bn yen)
- July exports +12.2% y/y (vs. expected +12.8% and prior was +7.4%)
- July imports +19.6% y/y (vs. expected +16.0%, prior +11.8%)
- All China new home prices +7.5% y/y for July and more here
- China to relax foreign investment rules for new ‘free-market’ zones
- “China’s New “Secret Stimulus” Program: Likonomics Is Dead”
- New Zealand revokes export certificates on Westland milk (more details here, here and here)
- New Zealand Q2 PPI data: Input PPI 0.6% q/q (vs. 0.6% expected), Output PPI 1.0% q/q (vs. 0.7% expected)
- New Zealand services PMI for July 58.1 (vs. 55.1 prior)
- UK: Rightmove House prices for August: -1.8% m/m (vs. +0.3% m/m prior)
- Australia New Motor Vehicle sales for July: -3.5% m/m (vs. 3.6% prior)
- Hilsenrath’s piece finally published, not much to it
EUR, GBP, CHF all confined to tght ranges in Asia today.
USD/JPY was more of a mover, trading to a 97.86 high as the Nikkei rallied after the Tokyo Stock Exchange opened for the week. Exporter selling, though, and a tumble in stocks, saw USD/JPY to session lows, hitting 97.36 before settling sideways and ticking quietly higher to mid-range around 97.55.
NZD/USD weathered headlines related to further dairy scares, trading as low as only 0.8093 before finding good support. AUD and NZD rallied, taking the kiwi to a 0.8129 high.
AUD/USD was bid pretty much the whole session, US names the early buyers taking it above 0.9200 and after a pause back below the figure on to take out the sellers at 0.9220/25 and fill stops above here. The run was not sustained above 0.9330 (33 the high) with liquidity seekers happy to take on the buy stops and seeing it fall back to 0.9210/15 as I write.
