The dollar was still stuck in a rut through most of yesterday’s trading, in spite of a weekly jobs report that showed jobless claims climbed to 500,000. But Bundesbank head Alex Weber dropped a bomb on the markets late yesterday and sent the euro (EUR) running for cover. The euro has fallen over one cent in early trading and is in danger of losing the $1.27 handle for the first time in a month. More on the euro in a sec, but first let’s review the jobs data, which dominated the news yesterday.
[Read more...]China Reduces Treasury Holdings
August 17, 2010 By Leave a Comment
Front and center today, the TIC flows data from June was very interesting yesterday… Before we get into this, let me explain what I’m talking about for the new “kidsâ€� in class… TIC stands for Treasury International Capital, and it’s just a fancy way of saying that someone is tracking the net security purchases… Why is this important? Well, security purchases by foreigners is how the US finances its ever growing deficit. For example, the trade deficit and foreign direct investment makes up the current account… But just to keep this simple, the trade deficit in June was $49.9 billion… The net security purchases to finance that deficit in June was… $44.4 billion…
[Read more...]Will the FOMC Announce More Quantitative Easing?
August 10, 2010 By Leave a Comment
Well, that slippage that I was seeing yesterday morning turned into a dollar rally, and has continued throughout the night with the euro (EUR) losing 1 1/4-cents… It’s about the same with Aussie dollars (AUD), and the Norwegian krone (NOK), which I highlighted yesterday, and gave it the old “Pfennig kiss of deathâ€�!
[Read more...]European Data Show Further Strength
July 22, 2010 By Leave a Comment
Another busy day here at EverBank yesterday, but today promises to be a bit of a break. All of our visitors left late yesterday afternoon, and the systems which I have been testing are down for the next few days. The weather also looks like it has finally calmed down a bit after thunderstorms rolled through again yesterday afternoon. The markets probably won’t calm down, as we have a plethora of data releases today, along with further testimony from Bernanke and the release of the European stress tests.
[Read more...]Canadian Rate Hike and Oil Price Boost the Loonie
July 21, 2010 By Leave a Comment
We had some pretty unsettled weather come through the area, yesterday, with the lightening and thunder producing quite a show. The currency markets, on the other hand, were quite stable. The biggest gainer was the yen (JPY), and the largest loser was the euro; but neither moved more than 0.65% versus the US dollar… Tight ranges across the board for the currency markets.
[Read more...]Will the Euro Rally Last?
July 16, 2010 By Leave a Comment
Front and center this morning, the euro (EUR) is rising once again, and now this recovery is beginning to smell like it’s gone too far, too fast for me… Yesterday I told you the euro had gone through the 1.27 handle quickly… Well, 1.28 didn’t last one day either, and now the euro is poking through the clouds to sniff 1.30 again. The single unit is trading right now, as I write, at 1.2975… I’ve seen it a bit higher when I first turn on the screens, but talk about a rise! Actually, that’s a 5.5% rise in the euro in the past month…
[Read more...]Trichet Gives the Euro Some Support
July 9, 2010 By Leave a Comment
The euro (EUR) remained well bid yesterday, rising above $1.27 for the first time since May, after European Central Bank (ECB) President, Trichet, had some encouraging words for the Eurozone. Trichet said that he didn’t believe that the things were as bad in Europe as the markets have made them out to be. The ECB President made his remarks at a press conference after the ECB left its benchmark rate at a record low of 1%.
[Read more...]Some Good Alternatives to US Dollars on Bad US Data Prints
June 25, 2010 By Leave a Comment
Today the G-20 meeting starts in Toronto. I hear they have “locked down the streets,� sure glad they don’t hold one of those boondoggles in my neck of the woods!
I think today we’ll have some “cautionary tradingâ€� ahead of the meeting, as traders just don’t know what to expect, other than the billing going into the meeting of an “austerity versus spendingâ€� fight between the US and Germany… Right now, that “cautionary tradingâ€� has a bias to buy dollars, and yen (JPY)…
[Read more...]
More Stimulus?
Today has seen a return to risk aversion, after watching the currencies have their way with the dollar, yen (JPY), franc (CHF), and Treasuries on Friday. Remember on Friday when I told you that in the “old daysâ€� you could bet a dollar to a Krispy Kreme that if the Jobs Jamboree was bad, the dollar would get sold, and if it was good, the dollar would rally, but that had changed during the financial meltdown… And so it was on Friday… The labor report wasn’t as bad as it was thought to be, but the dollar got sold.
[Read more...]