Some notable headlines from the previous session:
- Australian April Jobs: Employment +4.0K (vs. +30K expected) & Jobless rate 3.9% (3.9%)
- China coronavirus - Shanghai announces plans for further (slow) easing of restrictions
Other major currencies are now on the mend against the dollar (and yen), with the aussie gaining strongly. AUD/USD is up near 1% to 0.7020 as the pivot around the 0.7000 handle continues to play out. Buyers and sellers are battling in that region, with the former defending a push towards the key hourly moving averages for the time being:
Elsewhere, EUR/USD is up 0.4% to just above 1.0500 again as the push and pull continues on the week so far. GBP/USD is also posting a modest recovery towards 1.2400 as the selling pressure failed to really test its key hourly moving averages as well - seen at 1.2314-36 at the moment.
It was a torrid day for risk trades yesterday with the S&P 500 falling by 4.0% and Nasdaq down by 4.7%. There is some breathing room for now with US futures mildly higher but as mentioned yesterday, the storm clouds are brewing.