Forex Blog

EUR/USD seemed almost completely independent of the important fundamental indicators which were signaling the worsening economical situation in USA. EUR/USD was falling by more than 100 pips during the day, but then it returned to a more moderate loss - 50 pips.

Manufacturers’ durable goods orders in October 2007 decreased by $0.9 billion which is 0.4% the previous month value. The consensus forecast for this value was at 0%, meaning that the orders shouldn’t been changing at all.

National Association of Realtors announced its October existing home sales number - 4.97 million annualized, well below both 5.03 million in September and 5.00 expected for October.

Crude oil inventories reported by the U.S. Department of Energy from November 16 to November 23 declined by 0.4 million barrels, showing another week without an increase, which is so needed after some major inventories downfall several weeks ago.

U.S. dollar looks unsure whether to fall or to rise on the Forex market after some important macroeconomic indicators were released today. One of the most important data came out from the University of Michigan and Reuters - Michigan Sentiments Index, which represents consumer confidence. Consumer confidence is important, because it will determine future consumer spendings that in their turn fuel the U.S. economy growth.

Michigan Sentiments Index in November was 76.1; it fell by 4.8 points compared to its October value of 80.9. But according to over-pessimistic expectations (that were at 75.0), Michigan index did quite well this month. Of course, objectively it didn’t.

Initial jobless claims for the previous week were released today by the U.S. Department of Labor. They fell right into the market forecast value of 330k, lower than last week’s 341k (revised from 339k).

Leading market indicators are considered to be weak in their influence on markets behavior, but nevertheless their value for the October reflects current U.S. economical situation - decrease by 0.5%, below 0.3% expected drop and, of course, worse than 0.3% growth in September.

And with the U.S. commercial crude oil inventories another falling week, oil can be expected to see new record highs in the next days. Crude oil inventories decreased by 1.1 million barrels last week, following the 2.8 growth on previous week. High oil prices may hit dollar on Forex, pushing to the new bottoms.

EUR/USD is hitting its all-time record high level beyond 1.4800 after the pessimistic analysts’ forecasts on housing data appeared to be almost completely true today. Housing Starts for the October grew to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1.229 million, compared to 1.193 million in September and 1.175 million expected for this month. Meanwhile Building Permits dropped significantly - October seasonally adjusted annual rate appeared 1.178 million, compared to 1.261 million in September and 1.200 million expected by the market for this month. Significant dropdown in new building permits will eventually lower the housing starts numbers in future, thus the all-negative market reaction to this housing report.

Federal Open Market Committee released the minutes for their October 30/31 meeting today. As it was generally expected by the traders, the concerns of FOMC are slowly but surely moving from inflation to a possible economical slowdown on the background of the housing crisis, the subprime lending crisis and unemployment destabilization in U.S. These were also the first minutes to include Federal Reserve Governors and Reserve Bank Presidents projections of the future economy development. Actually, those projections don’t look very informative to me (with a high possible forecast error and all the numbers to close to the current), but it is a good sign that FOMC will share its views regularly and formally, without traders having to guess “what did they mean by that node”-style. Here is the introduction of the projections from the minutes:

The Committee then resumed its discussion of an enhanced role for the economic projections that are made periodically by the members of the Board of Governors and the Reserve Bank presidents. At this meeting, participants reached a consensus on increasing the frequency and expanding the content of the projections that in the past have been released to the public in summary form twice a year. They agreed to publish with the minutes a summary of participants’ economic projections made for this meeting and to release a press statement describing the plan for the future. The release of more frequent forecasts covering longer time spans and accompanied by explanations of those forecasts was seen as providing the public with more context for understanding the Committee’s monetary policy decisions.

I hope that FOMC will continue to improve its information sharing services and these projections will start to offer a more clear picture of the market to the traders soon.

EUR/USD stopped its fall today and jumped back up to 1.4670 levels on Forex after today’s Federal Reserve release on industrial production. In this October industrial production fell by 0.5% after 0.2% growth in September and median expectation at 0.1% for this month. That means that FOMC will probably need to adjust U.S. interest rates once again to stimulate economy growth.

With the decrease of industrial production, economy of the Unites States showed a decrease in industrial capacity utilization (which, of course, could be a cause for production drop). It fell from September’s 82.2% to 81.7%, while an insignificant difference was expected (82.0%).

While Henry Paulson of U.S. Treasury spoke that Government will conduct a “strong dollar” policy. Its hardly can be done with such economical indicators reports. “Currency will represent the U.S. economical growth” - that was the main idea of Paulson’s speech. But if economy is taking damage? Dollar will continue its demise.

Net foreign purchases of the long-term U.S. securities in September were at $55.4 billion. This is better than the August’s negative -$33.6 billion, but worse than expected number ($66.0 billion) and average 2006 monthly net foreign purchases ($97.2 billion).

The release of the not so good news from the U.S. economy caused a wave of bullish dollar speculation on Forex with the increased risk aversion sentiments among traders. Going back from stocks to bonds wasn’t prevented even by the fear of another possible cut rate before the year’s end. EUR/USD fell from almost 1.4700 to the powerful psychological support level of 1.4600.

Bureau of Labor Statistics published its consumer inflation data - CPI increased only by 0.2% in October, whereas 0.3% growth was mostly anticipated. U.S. Department of Labor gave its numbers for the previous week’s initial jobless claims - 339,000 - 14,000 higher than expected.

Crude oil inventories report finally gave a positive sentiment for the dollar bullish traders - there was a 2.8 million barrels growth last week. A good sign after some major decreases, which spiked oil prices to $100/barrel and depreciated dollar against other currencies.

Unexpectedly, Philadelphia Fed General Business Conditions Index increased significantly in November compared to October - constituting 8.2 against 6.8 in October with even more pessimistic forecasts for November.

After Bureau of Labor Statistics reported its statistical data for October Producer Price Index (which indirectly affects Consumer Price Index with a time lag) today, U.S. dollar began reclaiming some of its strength against major currencies. Most notably - against Euro which grew significantly against all majors today. After PPI report dollar went back from past 1.4700 levels to 1.4670 levels. PPI increased by 0.1% - lower than pessimistic forecast value of 0.3%, that was after September 1.1% growth. Core PPI didn’t change at all.

October Retail Sales came out at the expected level of growth, increasing by 0.2%, while September numbers were revised from 0.6% to 0.7% increase. The same situation was observed with September Business Inventories report - growth by 0.4% and previous month number revised from 0.1% to 0.3% increase.

Good PPI increases the chances for interest rates cut by Fed. But today Richard Fisher (Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas President) spoke about the Fed’s vision of U.S. economy growth as strong and inflation risks as a more important factor. Perhaps, lower producer prices inflation caused more demand for U.S. dollar basing on its increased buying ability.

U.S. dollar started its decline against other majors almost with the beginning of today’s Asian trading session. EUR/USD broke through 1.4600 level but fell from it several times. Overall trading day for EUR/USD can be described as the “highly volatile correction”.

The only important (to Forex market) economical data from U.S. today is Federal budget deficit figures by U.S. Treasury. It came out better expected - lower by almost 4 billion dollars than consensus number, landing at -$55.5B. It is a good result, considering September $111.5B budget surplus, but it is worse than previous October -$49.3B.

Budget results report’s effect on currency market will be mostly determined by traders’ reaction; positive or negative, it will depend on their own interpretation of the budget deficit influence on the FOMC’s decisions.

The closer it is to the October 31st when the FOMC’s meeting on interest rates policy will be held the stronger the dollar bears feel themselves on the Forex market. With almost each day bringing new reasons for the Fed to decrease interest rate again this time the decision became clear now.

Initial jobless claims for the last week decreased compared to the previous week report, but still came out worse than expected - 331k compared to 339k previous week and 320k expected.

Durable goods orders by the manufacturers, according to U.S. Census Bureau, in September decreased by $3.8 billion or 1.7%, while previous value was revised from 4.9% (also decrease) to 5.3%. Now, considering that the markets were expecting increase by 1.5%, it is possible to say that manufacturing sector is suffering or at least is going to suffer something close to a crisis.

September new home sales increased a little from August number - 770k against 735k (but August value was revised from 795k) and they were still lower than expectations. But real estate sector is already known to be in downfall. So, at least for me nothing surprising here.

This day was very volatile on Forex EUR/USD pair, but it was without a distinct leader among those two. With dollar falling and rising during the day it ended almost at the same point it started. But trend for the rest of the week could have been probably founded today by two important fundamental reports on U.S. economics.

First, the crude oil inventories for the last week fell by whopping 5.29 million barrels. Department of Energy even changed the phrase in its report from “well above the upper end of the average range for this time of year” to “near the upper end of the average range”. With low oil inventories, the price for this vital commodity can continue its fast growth seen during the last days. And expensive oil will almost certainly mean cheap dollar.

Second, existing home sales for September showed decreased by almost 0.46 millions to 5.04M (total annual rate). That is more than 19% lower than the September 2006 figure and also significantly lower than National Association of Realtors expected for this September. Weak real estate reports adds another reason for FOMC to lower interest rates next meeting (31st of October). And that can’t be good for dollar too.

EUR/USD retraced back to 1.4200 level today after some very disappointing housing data came out in U.S. Overall situation continues to remain uncertain with the EUR/USD ranging between 1.4050 and 1.4250. It now formed a clear plateau pattern on the daily chart marking some major break in the Euro vs. Dollar struggle.

Housing report for September showed a further downfall in this economics sector with the decrease in both housing starts and building permits numbers exceeding pessimistic market forecasts. There were 1,191k housing starts (against 1,285k expected) and 1,226k new building permits (against 1,300k expected) this September.

Contrary to real estate sector bad news September CPI report showed a better than expected value - 0.3% against 0.2% expected, and that’s from the -0.1% in August.

Crude oil inventories report for the October 8-12 week showed a major increase in commercial oil inventories - 1.8 million barrels, which can easily compensate for the previous decrease by 1.67 million barrels.