Ups and downs as geopolitics reach new levels
The forex markets are up down and all around as the geopolitical climate storms influence the price action (and then some). Coming into the New York session, the ranking of the strongest and weakest has the pairs (ironically) relatively clustered together. The NZD is the strongest of the majors. The EUR is the weakest. The USD is leaning toward the strong side with gains vs all the majors (mostly vs the EUR, GBP and JPY) with the exception of the NZD.
Looking at the ranges and changes, the JPY pairs have been particularly volatile. The USDJPY move down nearly 80 pips on the day but has rebounded back into the positive territory and is up 27 pips currently. The GBPJPY fell over 120 pips and snapback higher as well. It is up 6 pips at the NA session snapshot. The EURUSD, GBPUSD and USDJPY have moved 25 to 30 pips from the close from yesterday. Each are near the day's extreme (higher dollar).
In other markets:
- Spot gold reached a high of $1611.42, but is currently near unchanged levels at $1573.90 (-0.3% and $-0.40)
- WTI crude oil futures after trading as high as $65.65 is currently trading at $62.08. That is $-0.63 or -0.97%
In the US stock market, the Dow futures are down over 400 points and the e-minis were down over 50 points at one point. Currently, the futures imply:
- Dow, -25.68 points
- S&P index, +5 points
- NASDAQ index +11 points
In the European stock markets, the major indices are mostly higher:
- German DAX, +0.35%
- France's CAC, +0.1%
- UK's FTSE at 100, -0.1%
- Spain's Ibex, +0.1%
- Italy's FTSE MIB, +0.5%
In the US debt market yields have also recovered from sharp declines last night and are only down marginally. The 10 year yields moved to a low of 1.703% at the lows. It is currently trading at 1.816%. The other issues had similar moves:
In the European debt market, the yields are mostly higher with the German yield leading the way at up 5.4 bps at -0.231%.
