The USDJPY continues its run to the upside. The pair is on day 12 of a strong higher prices/closes. The last down day was back on March 31. The price bottomed at 121.27 on that day. The high price today reached 128.45. That's a gain of 718 pips.
Moreover, that move is just the last trend leg to the upside. Since a swing low from February 24 at 114.40, the move has been 1405 pips. If you were to go back even further. The low for the year back on January 6 was at 102.586 or 2586 pips from the low of the year to the high of the year.
Looking at the daily chart above, the one correction in the recent surge to the upside saw the pair remain above its 38.2% retracement (the 30.2% retracement came in at 121.008 while the low price reached 121.271). That kept the buyers in firm control from the longer term perspective.
The current move to the upside in the USDJPY over the last 13 days has the 38.2% down at 125.708. For longer term bulls, it would take a move below that level to give the sellers "some" control from a longer term perspective. Even so, that would just be the minimum correction of the last move higher.
Trends are fast, directional and tend to go farther than what traders expect. That is certainly the case with the USDJPY.
Drilling all the way down to the 5 minute chart, in a post late yesterday, I commented how the sellers in the USDJPY tried to push the price below the 100/200 bar moving averages (blue and green lines in the chart below). As a result of the failed attempt to the downside, the price started to trade more to the upside in the late NY session.
Of note today in the early Asian session is the corrective move to the downside stalled right at the 100 bar moving average (blue line). Buyers leaned against the level and pushed the price back to the upside (that technical hold was key).
The price also corrected in the early European session down toward the 100 bar moving average only to find buyers once again (follow the blue line in the chart below). That kept the short term intraday bias firmly in the direction of the buyers
More recently, the price did dip below the 100 bar moving average, but that break failed. The price is now trading to a new session highs as I type as shorts were forced to cover once again. The price is running again with the price now up to 128.737. Shorts continue to get squeezed.
It would now take a move back below the rising 100 bar moving average (and stay below) to give the sellers some hope and comfort. Absent that, and the sellers are not winning.
It's all about control. It's all about winning. The technicals I use define the winners and losers and the bias. Until the sellers can show that they can take and keep control in the short term, the buyers are winning.
Stocks have started to move lower in premarket trading with the NASDAQ now down around 47 points. The 30 year yield is back up testing 3%.
