- US March consumer confidence 104.2 vs 101.0 expected
- US March Richmond Fed services index -17 vs -3 prior
- US January Case-Shiller 20-city house price index -0.4% m/m vs -0.5% expected
- US February advance goods trade balance -91.6B vs -91.0B expected
- US February wholesale inventories +0.2% vs -0.4% prior
- US sells 5-year notes at 3.665% vs 3.675% WI
- Sam Bankman-Fried accused of bribing Chinese officials
Markets:
- Gold up $16 to $1972
- WTI crude oil up $0.60 to $73.41
- S&P 500 down 1 point to 4005
- US 10-year yields up 3.6 bps to 3.56%
- NZD leads, USD lags
We're into the end-of-quarter period where the fundamentals take a back seat to flows and it showed today as the US dollar backed off despite higher Treasury yields and a strong consumer confidence reading. In equities, tech sold off including the high-flying chip sector after a great start to the year.
The dollar selling in New York trade was particularly stark against the commodity currencies with NZD and AUD adding around 30 pips each as USD/CAD failed at 1.3700 and then sank below 1.3600 to a three week low. The reaction to the federal budget so far has been minimal.
Cable was along for the ride as well, it stalled on the first test of the Asia high near 1.2330 but broke through on a second try as the dollar fell into the fix (watch for more of that tomorrow). The high print of 1.2349 was narrowly above last week's high and the best since Feb 1.
USD/JPY hit a session low at 130.42 in whippy trading early in New York but battled back to 131.15. However today's bond auction was stronger than yesterday and that capped the gains along with worsening sentiment in stocks.
EUR/USD finished the day up 50 pips but was less volatile and didn't get a big lift into the fix. It was the second day of gains for EUR/USD after a challenge of 1.0700 on Friday.
