• Moody’s: Many EU countries need “brutal” budget adjustments in coming years to avoid debt explosion
  • SNB’s Danthine: SNB has resources to counter any excessive rise of the swiss franc. Monetary policy is appropriate at the present time
  • Shanghai share index closes down 0.6%
  • German March jobless change -31k, better than median forecast +10k
  • Greece plans to issue global US dollar bond end April early May – Debt Agency
  • Euro zone March inflation estimated at 1.5% y/y, up from 0.9% in February, stronger than median forecast of 1.3% and highest since December 2008
  • Euro zone February unemployment hits 10% vs 9.9% in January, highest since August 1998. EU unemployment 9.6% from 9.5%, highest since data started in January 2000 – Eurostat
  • Trichet: Expects market participants to recognise credibility of measures on Greece. Regarding Greece, IMF expertise always welcome
  • Greek 5year CDS widen to 343.9 bps vs 333.9 at Tuesdays New York close. Whoops
  • China CBank: Will keep appropriately loose monetary policy. Faces tough task to control credit growth
  • Swiss KOF leading indicator 1.93 in March, better than median forecast of 1.90. Highest since November 2007
  • EU Commission quarterly report: Euro area recovering, but faces siginificant headwinds. Divergences show need for reform. Greece “in league of its own” regarding imbalances, competitiveness loss

Good morning session for euro. EUR/USD up at 1.3475 from early 1.3400, while EUR/JPY has advanced to 125.90 from an early 125.15. Euro has even managed marginal gain against firm pound, EUR/GBP up at .8893 from early .8880.

It’s all about month/quarter end flows today with much talk of EUR/USD fixing demand. The BIS helped matters coming in early buying around 1.3400. From there we’ve been as high as 1.3480, an Asian sovereign helping things along buying in the 1.3460 area. Stops were tripped in EUR/JPY through 125.50 and this also gave impetus.

GBP/USD up at 1.5150 from early 1.5080. After a rather uncertain start cable was suddently lifted over 1.5100 with a major Swiss bank cited as a very notable buyer along with a Uk clearer. We got to a session high 1.5178 before selling off amid talk of the BIS selling above 1.5170. Seems like Swiss had alot to do with cable';s fortunes this morning.

USD/JPY sits 93.40, effectively unchanged on the day. A slight dip saw decent buy intyerest emerge in the 93.15/20 area. Talk of decent stops gathered throughh 92.80 (93.78 2010 high) and again through 94.00.

AUD/USD up a little at .9165 from early .9150, amid talk of positive month/quarter end aussie flows.