AUD/USD news - page 36

 

EUR/USD forecast for the week of March 14, 2016 The EUR/USD pair initially fell during the course of the week but found enough support at the 1.08 level to turn things back around and form a very positive candle. Now that we have closed above the 1.1050 level, we now feel that the market will continue to go higher, probably reaching towards the 1.13 level given enough time. Above there, we could very easily find yourselves going to the 1.15 level after that. We have no interest in selling at this point in time, and as a result remain “buy only” at the moment.

 

Australia - Westpac says seeing some stress in consumer loans Reuters reporting on comments from a Westpac executive (unnamed at this stage)

  • Expects "reasonably strong" credit growth in business banking going forward
  • Says comfortable with stress levels in commercial business bank, not seeing "major cracks"
  • Says seeing some stress in consumer loans
 

Australian businesses the most pessimistic for two years Dun and Bradstreet's (DB) latest business expectations survey shows businesses are more pessimistic about the next three months than any quarter over the past two years

  • Businesses expect sales, profits, employment and capital investment to decline in the last quarter of the financial year compared to the previous three months
  • DB's economic adviser Stephen Koukoulas:

    • Their bleak outlook signals slower economic growth in 2016
    • 'There has been a fall in each of the components of the Index, with the overall Business Expectations Index (BEI) slipping to its lowest level in over two years'
    • 'The BEI is consistent with GDP (gross domestic product) growth of around 2.5 per cent'
    • 'While it is not yet time to be too concerned about the slide in expectations, any further deterioration in the months ahead would present challenges for the economy and would result in the need to recast our assessment of the state of the business landscape'
    • Says its difficult to pinpoint the reason for the negative outlook but suggested the upcoming federal election and global economic uncertainty may be contributing

    More:

  • Despite businesses' more downbeat expectations, most noted stronger actual performance over the 2015 fourth quarter
 

AUD/USD: Aussie Rebounds on Improved Sentiment, Commodity Revival A soft start to the week for the Australian dollar looked as if it would be only short lived, with the currency making solid ground against the greenback on Wednesday after oil prices spiked.

West Texas Intermediate futures rallied 5.27% to $37.77 per barrel on Wednesday during the US session after the Energy Information Administration (EIA) revealed a 4.9 million decline in oil barrel inventories last week, sparking hope that the global supply glut which has driven prices to multi-year lows is starting to dissipate.

Brent crude futures also rose sharply on the news, trading 5.04% higher at $39.78 per barrel, supporting currencies linked to commodities, including the Australian dollar.

The AUD/USD jumped 0.89% to $0.7608 on Wednesday afternoon in New York from $0.7540 at the close of trade on Tuesday, hitting an intraday high of $0.7619, its strongest level since the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) tried to talk down the strength of the currency earlier this week.

"Market sentiment has improved from the risk-off mood early in the week," BNZ currency strategist Jason Wong noted. "Better sentiment might reflect the circa 5% gain for oil prices on better news for the sector."

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AUD/USD: Aussie Crashes 1% as Fear Takes Over The greenback was pushing higher on Thursday and erased daily losses, with the AUD/USD pair spotted trading at daily lows at $0.7515, 1% lower on the day during the US session.

The risk-off sentiment reemerged on Thursday, mainly from the plummeting USD/JPY pair, which was spotted more than 1.5% lower on the day and dropped to ¥108.00. This move prompted selling on stock markets and hurt higher-yielding currencies as well.

Yesterday's Federal Open Market Committee brought little surprise, aside from showing some governors had argued for a rate hike in April. The greenback remained muted after the release and continued to trade weaker on Thursday also.

"While some have argued that a rise in rates should happen sooner rather than later, given the improvement in economic data it should also be noted that since those minutes were published, a lot of the most recent data has been disappointing on the consumption side pointing to a significant slowdown in Q1 GDP estimates," Michael Hewson, chief market analyst at CMC Markets UK, said on Thursday.

Thursday's usual release of initial jobless claims improved from 276,000 to 267,000, while continuing claims worsened to 2,191K from 2,172K booked previously.

Later in the day, Federal Reserve (Fed) chair Janet Yellen will have a conversation with former Fed chairs Ben Bernanke, Alan Greenspan and Paul Volcker, which might be interesting.

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AUD/USD Technical Analysis: Bullish Momentum Prevails The AUD/USD currency pair spiked above the $0.77 handle on upbeat Chinese export data, with momentum remaining bullish.

Aussie bulls received fresh impetus from stronger than expected Chinese trade data on Wednesday.

Data showed imports picking-up pace in Australia’s biggest export destination, highlighting improved Chinese external demand.

The AUD/USD spiked through the $0.77 handle post data and hit fresh monthly highs at $0.7716, before paring some gains to trade at $0.77 levels.

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Australia Employment change (March): +26.1 K (+17K expected) Australian employment data for March Employment Change: +26.1 K

  • expected +17.0K, prior -0.7K revised from +0.3K
  • Unemployment Rate: 5.7%

    • expected 5.9%, prior 5.8%
    • Full Time Employment Change, -8.8 K

    • prior was +13.9K (revised from)+15.9K

    Part Time Employment Change, +34.9 K

  • prior was -14.7K (revised up from -15.6K)

Participation Rate, 64.9%

expected 65.0%, prior was 64.9%

 

AUD/USD forecast for the week of April 18, 2016 The AUD/USD pair rose during the course of the week, using the 0.75 level as massive support. That support extends all the way down to the 0.74 level, and as a result we believe that this market will continue to expand and go higher given enough time. Pullbacks will be thought of as potential buying opportunities, and we should eventually try to grind our way towards the 0.80 level, but it is going to take quite a bit of effort to get to that region. We have no interest in selling.

 

AUD/USD: Aussie Plunges as Doha Fails to Deliver The so-called aussie erased part of its gains on Monday but still traded significantly lower as the negative effects of the failed Doha meeting sent oil spiraling lower.

The pair traded 0.64% lower at $0.7672 on Monday morning ahead of the European session.

Over the weekend, major oil OPEC and non OPEC producers met to discuss a production freeze agreement in Doha, Qatar. This created a positive sentiment over the last weeks as many traders expected the agreement to be reached, helping oil prices to recover.

However, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia publicly declared its unwillingness to join the agreement unless Iran participated. Iran refused to join any output freeze or cut, until their production returns back to pre-sanction levels, as they are now able to export oil once again after sanctions were lifted.

This dispute resulted in Saudi Arabia's boycott of the deal which effectively tanked the agreement and pushed oil prices to big intraday losses of nearly 7%. During the day the prices slightly recovered, as WTI traded 4.7% lower at $38.46 before the European trading session.

"After talks that dragged on for ten hours over their scheduled conclusion, Saudi Arabia, Russia, Iran and friends were unable to come up with anything even remotely resembling a solution that would limit supply to support the price of oil," Dane Williams of Vantage FX said.

The Australian dollar was significantly hurt by the inability of oil producers to reach an agreement, as it belongs to commodity currencies, along with the Canadian dollar and New Zealand dollar.

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AUD/USD forecast for the week of April 25, 2016 The AUD/USD pair broke higher during the course of the week, and then turned back around to form a massive shooting star. That being the case, the market looks as if we could pull back from here, but we do see a significant amount of support below at the 0.75 level. With this, the market may offer short-term selling opportunity, but as far as long-term trades are concerned you’re probably going to be better served staying on the sidelines and waiting for a more significant signal. Ultimately, this is a market that tends to follow the gold markets, which are essentially going sideways at this point in time.

If we do pullback, a supportive candle in this general vicinity should be a nice buying opportunity. When you look at the weekly chart, you can see that there is a lot of noise above the 0.77 level extending all the way to the 0.80 level. This was early in 2015, so this is previous “market memory” coming into play, and there will more than likely be quite a bit of order flow in this general vicinity.

If we break above the top of the shooting star, that would be a sure sign of strength, and could send this market looking for the aforementioned 0.80 level again. With this being the case, the market looks as if it is going to make some type of strong decision soon, and it could be in concert with the gold market, keep that in mind please. Ultimately, the 0.80 level above is a very important number from the longer-term charts, and as a result we would be very interested to see what happens in that general vicinity.

It is not until we break down below the 0.74 level that we could even consider selling this market for any real length of time, although we recognize that would be a very choppy move as well. The Australian dollar has been sold off rather drastically over the last couple of years, and perhaps now people are starting to question as to whether or not it has been unjustly done.

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