NEWS / Foreign Exchange

USD steady with further risk unwinding against the JPY

New Zealand dollar

NZD remains supported despite equity market jitters. The NZD remained rangebound on Monday despite another equity market slump due to Citigroup??™s continued woes and the resignation of the Chairman and CEO of the bank. NZ wages were up strongly in Q3, the details provide another headache for the RBNZ in terms of the serious inflation implications for the economy. The NZD barely reacted to the lower equities or the inflationary data and traded a 0.7620 to 0.7655 range in a quiet local session. The currency was helped higher overnight in NY as it was bought against the AUD and the USD to close at 0.8350 and 0.7680 respectively.

Australian dollar

AUD drifts sideways in subdued trading. The AUD traded heavily on Monday but managed to rebound back late in the day. The price action was contained between 0.9185 and 0.9225 during local trading with the falling stock market tempering any gains in the currency. The Aust inflation gauge saw a further broad based increase in Oct and Aust job ads rose to a new high in Oct. Although tomorrow??™s rate decision is almost a foregone conclusion the data will add to the chances of another hike next month. The AUD slipped to 0.9160 briefly during the offshore session as the currency was sold against the NZD; the fall was short lived however and the AUD closed at 0.9200.

Major currencies

USD steady with further risk unwinding against the JPY. Further unwinding of JPY carry trades saw the USD weaken against that currency yesterday and overnight, with investors continuing to show an underlying nervousness towards holding risky assets. However some of the USD??™s losses against the JPY were later cut back after the release of Oct ISM data, which suggested that the service sector remains healthy, helping ease some recent concerns about the state of the US economy. Meanwhile, in a speech overnight, the USD ignored comments by Federal Reserve Governor Frederic Mishkin who stated interest rate cuts haven??™t changed inflation expectations and the Fed can never take its ???eye off the ball??™. Elsewhere, the Canadian dollar posted a new low around 0.9305 against the USD, with markets still focussed on an eventual attempt at 0.9000.

Economic data and events

US ISM non manufacturing jumps to 55.8 in Oct. The construction and services ISM rose back to the 55.8 level it sat on in the first two months of Q3. Encouragingly, new orders also rose to around that level, a sign that the headline improvement was not erratic. This result contrasts with the weaker manufacturing ISM for Oct, and suggests that the growth momentum displayed by the economy in Q3 may have continued into the early part of the current quarter.
Fed governor Fred Mishkin spoke last night. He was encouraged by the lack of spillover from housing to the rest of the economy which ???bodes well???; he described the economy as ???quite resilient???; and emphasised that inflation risk was still a significant consideration for the Fed.
Bank of Japan minutes: some interesting tidbits from the Sep meeting. The Bank seems to be of the view that Japan can weather a US slowdown (due to strength in the emerging world) but not a full blown recession. On inflation, it was noted that "price leaders" had been more active recently. Concern about the US financial sector was balanced with the line about misallocation of resources in the long run if policy was set unrealistically.
European Sentix investor confidence down from 15.3 to14.0 in Nov. This survey of 2600 institutional and private investors and analysts, conducted in the first three days of Nov, found deteriorating sentiment for the fifth month running, although the slippage was only modest compared to that seen over the prior four months. Expectations were almost unchanged (??“10.8 from ??“10.5) but the current measure fell 2.5 pts to 42.0.
UK services and factory data weak. The services PMI dipped from 56.7 to a four year low of 53.1 at the start of Q4, and industrial production ended Q3 on a very weak note, with a manufacturing-led fall that the Statistician has estimated would shave 0.04 ppts off the GDP bottom line when it is revised later this month (advance estimate was 0.8%). Two very weak reports that will tend to increase speculation that the BoE will soon be contemplating a rate cut (though no move is expected this week).