The JPY and USD have firmed overnight in Asia as risk aversion returns. The trigger for the souring of sentiment was a Bloomberg article highlighting the plight of the U.S. automakers.
The piece says that Obama believes a quick negotiated bankruptcy is the most likely way for GM to restructure and become a competitive automaker. It added that the President is also prepared to let Chrysler go bankrupt and be sold off piecemeal if it can’t form an alliance with Fiat. Although the Whitehouse came out and denied, labelling the claims “not accurate”, the damage was done.
Funnily enough Asian stocks did ok, bolstered by speculation Japanese and South Korean automakers would benefit from the possible bankruptcies of their U.S. counterparts.
EUR/USD is down at 1.3190 from a North America close Tuesday around 1.3280.
European economic data for release today is as follows:
07:30 GMT: Swiss SVME PMI (Mar) expected 33.0
07:45 GMT: Italian PMI manufacturing (Mar) expected 35.0
07:50 GMT: French PMI manufacturing (Mar) final expected 36.3
07:55 GMT: German PMI manufacturing (Mar) final expected 32.4
08:00 GMT: Euro zone PMI manufacturing (Mar) final expected 34.0
08:30 GMT: UK PMI manufacturing (Mar) expected 35.0
08:30 GMT: UK BOE housing equity withdrawal Q-4 expected -£6.8 bln
09:00 GMT: Euro zone unemployment rate expected 8.3%
